Word from the President
ESWET welcomes this focus on looking into all measures that can reduce the generation of unrecyclable waste in the first place. ESWET warmly welcomes this productive approach which has the potential to yield the most significant improvements in the materials value chain. It is hence with great pleasure that ESWET hosted its yearly workshop on the theme of plastic waste and many innovative ideas were brought forward by the featured speakers from the European Parliament and Commission. Along with forward-looking plastic waste reduction measures, which will strengthen European competitiveness and resourceindependence, ESWET called for another major initiative to help improving waste management: a ban on landfilling of recyclable and combustible waste. This industry-led movement, notified by a joint letter from many sectors, is bound to continue in 2014 when the appropriately named “year of waste” looks into technically-feasible measures to improve waste management.
ESWET supports strategies to reduce waste generation, along with those pushing waste away from landfills and pulling materials into recycling streams. This will quickly improve waste/resource management, but only if citizens demand it and support the development of the infrastructure necessary to make it a reality. Failure in any of these strategic components would significantly slow any progress. The industry has solutions to make waste management become resource management. It depends on the citizens to support the holistic set of measures necessary to make it a reality. Waste-to-Energy is part of the solution and visionary decision-makers across Europe have supported it. In this crucial electoral year, what if Waste-to-Energy was not depicted erroneously as a threat to recycling but as a tool towards a more resourceefficient Europe?
Edmund Fleck ESWET President
Activity Report 2013 | ESWET 5