The recycling rates and use of recycled materials in the in the European Union (EU) are steadily growing.

Overall, the EU recycled around 55% of all waste excluding major mineral waste in 2016 (compared with 53% in 2010).

This information was published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.

 The rate for recovering construction and demolition waste reached 89% (2016), the recycling rate of packaging waste exceeded 67% (2016, compared with 64% in 2010) while the rate of plastic packaging was over 42% (2016, compared with 24% in 2005). The recycling rate for municipal waste stood at 46% (2017, compared with 35% in 2007) and for the waste of electrical and electronic equipment such as computers, televisions, fridges and mobile phones, which include valuable materials which can be recovered (e-waste) in the EU reached 41% (2016, compared with 28% in 2010).

In spite of these high recycling rates, on average only 12% of material resources used in the EU in 2016 came from recycled products and recovered materials - thus saving extraction of primary raw materials. This indicator, called circular material use rate, measures the contribution of recycled materials to overall demand. The indicator is lower than recycling rates, which measure the share of waste which is recycled, because some types of materials cannot be recycled, e.g. fossil fuels burned to produce energy or biomass consumed as food or fodder.

A circular economy aims to maintain the value of products, materials and resources for as long as possible by returning them into the product cycle at the end of their use, while minimising the generation of waste.

Yesterday, the European Commission adopted the Report on the implementation of the Circular Economy Action Plan. The monitoring framework shows the progress in four areas of the circular economy: production and consumption, waste management, secondary raw materials and competitiveness and innovation.