The volume of recycled waste collected by GreenPak last year has actually increased by 25 per cent over 2016, according to the cooperative’s latest figures, contrasting with reports that recycling had taken a huge knock.
The cooperative — the biggest collector of recycled waste on the island, covering more than 70 per cent of local councils — issued a statement following reports in the media that recycling had dropped to 6,658 tonnes between January and November 2017, just half the amount handled in the whole of 2016.
GreenPak is entrusted with collecting recycled waste and a good portion of this is then sent to the treatment facilities of Wasteserv, a government entity. GreenPak explained that the figures released in Parliament were actually for the amount of material that Wasteserv had exported, not collected — Wasteserv is responsible for managing recycled waste, not collecting it.
In fact, GreenPak CEO Mario Schembri pointed out that last year the cooperative had recovered 22,136 tonnes of waste, registering a 25 per cent increase over the 17,650 tonnes collected in 2016.
“It was particularly encouraging to note that in 2017 we collected 3,378 tonnes of plastic waste resulting in a nine per cent increase over 2016. This means we have managed to recover the equivalent of 57 per cent of the plastic packaging our business partners put on the market,” Ing. Schembri said.
“We believe that GreenPak’s investment in recent campaigns encouraging consumers to crush plastic waste has contributed to this impressive increase,” he added.
Reacting to the figures released in Parliament, Ing. Schembri believes that the drop in Wasteserv’s exportation figures could be a consequence of the large fire that engulfed most of the Sant’ Antnin waste treatment plant last year.
Wasteserv, he said, was now operating fromsmaller plant, which meant it took longer to export bigger stockpiles.
“I’m not alarmed by the rate of recycling in Malta. As a country there has been a marked improvement in people’s attitudes and behaviour, even though we could be moving at a quicker rate,” MrSchembri said.
“As GreenPak we are committed to protecting the environment and we welcome Environment Minister Jose Herrera’s recent announcement that the government is working on new laws to make recycling compulsory,” he added.