Waste

Abstract

Abstract The one noteworthy development in the survey year 2004 was the publication of Directive 2004/12/EC amending Directive 94/62/EC on Packaging and Packaging Waste. The Directive amends the minimum and maximum targets which Member States have to achieve for reuse generally, and for recycling of packaging waste in particular. It furthermore clarifies the definition of ‘waste’ and ‘packaging’, and includes provisions for current and future Member States which are allowed to achieve less ambitious targets for a limited period. The current targets have to be reviewed by the end of 2007. The European Commission (Commission) has adopted an amended Proposal concerning transboundary shipments of waste. The amended Proposal rejects the most controversial parts of the proposed amendments adopted by the European Parliament (EP). The Commission, for instance, rejects the suggestion to apply the principles of self-sufficiency and proximity to shipments destined for recovery, as well as the suggestion of the EP that Member States be allowed to object to export and import of waste on the basis of national waste management plans. The Commission calls this latter suggestion incompatible with the EC Treaty. The Council of Ministers (Council) has already examined the amended Proposal. The reader will be familiar with the fact that the Commission already made its initial Proposal in 2003. The Commission’s Proposal is intented to, on the one hand, adapt the European rules to international Treaties, in particular in the framework of the OECD and the Basel Convention. The Commission wishes, on the other hand, to achieve a more extensive codification in the administrative practices of the Member States, which after all increasingly apply the exception clauses.