Mepa Register Of Companies raises confidentiality issues

Malta Independent Tuesday, 18 September 2007, 00:00 Last update: about 15 years ago

A requirement by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority that companies should register as producers of waste packaging has raised issues of confidentiality and the registration process, which was due to be concluded in January, was extended and is now due to be finalised at the end of this month.

The requirement applied to all those companies which, in the course of their business, created discarded packaging.

Companies trading in consumer goods such as food items, beverages, clothes, toiletries, stationery, detergents, paints, electrical goods, pharmaceuticals and any packaged product imaginable fell under the definition of packaging waste producers.

Following this registration process, Mepa will publish the list of the registered companies including the quantity of packaging they claim to have put on the Maltese market last year.

The difficulty companies faced was the public exposure of sensitive data. Apart from declaring that they are producers of packaging waste, companies need to accompany this statement with a precise breakdown of packaging placed in the market during 2006.

Once the packaging volumes are established, the regulations further require that companies give details on how the discarded packaging was recovered and recycled.

In practice, individual companies find it difficult to recover the packaging generated by their trade. Instead many are opting to form part of the GreenPak Mepa-authorised Compliance Scheme. When companies voluntarily join GreenPak, the individual company’s obligations are transferred onto the scheme and GreenPak then recovers packaging waste on their behalf.

“Many companies are now realising the importance of becoming part of the GreenPak scheme,” said a GreenPak spokesman. “The confidential information of individual companies is protected as GreenPak discloses global figures to Mepa. Additionally, the GreenPak scheme also provides a practical solution for recovering packaging.”

GreenPak is part of the European wide Green Dot organisation that is responsible for diverting millions of tonnes of discarded consumer packaging away from landfill and towards recycling. In 2006, the GreenPak system well surpassed the national recovery targets and is again on course to repeat this achievement in 2007.

Companies that are yet to register can obtain the necessary forms by downloading them directly from the GreenPak website at