Packaging Recycling: A Possible Driver for Garbage Reform in Russia

Effective management of production and consumption waste is one of the priority objectives of the implementation of the Ecology national project. As part of this area, not only the elimination of unauthorized landfills and the restoration of the territories in which they are located is provided, but also the formation of an integrated system for handling solid municipal waste (hereinafter - MSW), including the creation of conditions for the secondary processing of all production and consumption waste prohibited for disposal.

Despite the fact that the “garbage reform” started on January 1, 2019, for the first year of implementation, it did not show effective results. Thus, according to statistics, the total area of landfills and landfills in Russia remains within 4 million hectares, and this figure increases by 0.4 million hectares annually. “While maintaining the rate of waste generation by 2026, the landfill area in Russia will double,” the experts expressed their concerns during a press conference last week to discuss the problems and prospects of developing legislation on production and consumption waste.

Representatives of the government and business consider the absence of an effective system for the recycling of garbage, primarily packaging, to be one of the constraining factors that impede the effective implementation of the national project targets. Despite a number of specific features of packaging (a high proportion of packaging waste in the MSW structure is about 70%, the short life cycle of packaging products - the bulk of the packaging is disposable and is sent to waste after use, the difference between the materials used for the manufacture of packaging products for collection and recycling ), packaging waste is collected and disposed of only partially. "The current state of the waste treatment system ensures the extraction of no more than 5-7% of useful components from MSW, while the majority of MSW containing useful components prohibited for disposal are sent in unsorted form to landfills for disposal," experts say.

In order to solve this problem, the deputy of the lower house of parliament, a member of the State Duma Committee on Ecology, Alexander Fokin, submitted to parliamentarians at the end of last year the bill “On Amending the Federal Law“ On Production and Consumption Wastes. ”Until March 7, feedback and suggestions were organized and comments on the document, and then it will be prepared for consideration by deputies of the State Duma in the spring session, which is expected to be held in April.

The key idea of the initiative is to impose the obligation to fulfill the extended responsibility of manufacturers (hereinafter - ROP) in respect of packaging produced in Russia on its direct manufacturers, regardless of whether they produce it for packaging third-party goods or packaging their own product. Recall that today the obligation to fulfill the RPR in respect of goods and packaging of goods lies with manufacturers and importers of goods and packaging, and with respect to packaging of goods produced in our country, it is with manufacturers of goods in this packaging. "Such a system for identifying ROP subjects causes confusion among producers, the impossibility of determining the supervised circle of subjects for an environmental collection administrator, reduces the quality of control over the fulfillment of waste disposal obligations by such organizations, and, as a result, the amount of utilized waste decreases," the explanatory note to the document says.

In addition, it is planned to exclude the establishment of waste disposal standards from the use of packaging and instead introduce the obligation of packaging manufacturers to ensure the disposal of waste from the use of packaging or to pay an environmental fee based on the entire mass of packaging released (imported). This is also convenient from the point of view of administering the ecological collection - since the number of producers of goods in the packaging amounts to tens of thousands, in the absence of a mechanism for their identification, the quality and quantity of administration of the collection and control over the implementation of recycling standards are significantly reduced. “Direct packaging manufacturers, by virtue of their comparative scarcity, are the most rational objects of control and administration in terms of the implementation of the RPR regarding the packaging of goods,” the developer of the bill said. According to experts, there are 4,147 packaging manufacturers in Russia, including 11 hollow glass manufacturing plants, 1296 paper packaging manufacturers, 2717 polymer packaging companies, and 150 metal packaging manufacturing enterprises.

According to the author of the bill, the environmental fee proposed for the introduction of all packaging produced in Russia will essentially be an investment fee, since packaging manufacturers will invest in packaging collection, transportation and subsequent processing or re-entry into circulation. Thus, the very concept of understanding packaging will be changed, which should be considered "not as garbage, but as a product that enters the market along with certain products contained in this package, that is, in fact - as a material resource that can be reused" Fokin believes.

In addition, the deputy identified three aspects of the amendments he developed:

• social (it is assumed that due to the re-involvement of resources in circulation, the cost of recycled packaging will be reduced, and therefore the cost of goods in this packaging);
• ecological (due to reduction in sales volumes and reduction of costs for the production of primary pulp, the task of preserving forests will be solved, and this, in turn, will have a beneficial effect on the climate, rivers, lakes, etc.);
• technological (it is planned to create a new branch of waste processing following the example of foreign countries, where the packaging recycling system has long been successfully operating).

At the same time, it is planned to launch the principle of "economic boomerang" through the mechanism of packaging recycling, which involves not only the use of packaging, its collection, but also recycling and recycling. The same scheme fits into the format for implementing the principles of a closed-loop economy (separate collection, transportation, processing, disposal and disposal), which is considered as one of the ultimate goals of making changes.

The main ideas of the bill were supported by the Ministry of Natural Resources of Russia. So, the head of the project office of the federal project "Clean Country" of the Ministry of Natural Resources of Russia Vadim Petrov believes that the document will not only solve the issue of administration ("will show the results of the ROP institute in 2021"), but also improve the institute of such responsibility.

In turn, the head of the "Fuel and Energy Complex" practice Andrei Sauter announced the calculation data regarding the expenses of Russians on waste disposal. According to him, at current rates of environmental fees, the largest price increase based on the composition of goods included in the minimum consumer basket is forecasted at 178.29 rubles. per person per year, which is 0.14% of the subsistence level in 2019, including for food products - by 143.92 rubles. per year, non-food items - 35.37 rubles. in year. "But from the experience of other countries where the packaging processing mechanism has already been implemented, this amount will be reduced," he assured.

As for the collection rate for packaging manufacturers, it is proposed to differentiate it depending on whether the packaging is recyclable and recyclable, and what raw material processing ratio is applicable (there will be one coefficient for environmentally friendly materials, and a higher pay ratio for non-environmentally friendly materials). According to experts, the profit from eco-collection in the first year can be about 33 billion rubles, in 3-4 years - about 165 billion rubles.

Summing up the discussion, Alexander Fokin said that the proposed bill could become a driver for the entire "garbage reform", which is still "stalled". It is expected that its implementation will help improve the procedure for administering the RWP, increase the amount of utilized waste within the framework of the RWP, as well as reduce the amount of packaging waste in the MSW, which will ultimately achieve the indicators for the processing and disposal of waste from the Ecology national project. The author of the initiative sees the creation of a closed cycle waste management industry as the ultimate goal of implementing amendments to create conditions for the involvement of packaging waste in the economy as secondary resources.

Source: http://www.garant.ru/