Isabel's blog

Businesses are sidestepping regulations aimed at reducing single-use plastic, potentially jeopardizing efforts to curb plastic waste, according to the Inspection for the Environment and Transport (ILT) in a report submitted to the Dutch Parliament. The ILT previously expressed concerns about the feasibility and vulnerability to fraud of these regulations. Companies are exploiting loopholes, such as using soft plastic wraps instead of hard plastic containers subject to a surcharge and opting for plastic bottles to evade bottle deposit obligations. These actions are not illegal but are deemed undesirable, with the weak implementation of rules attributed to the powerful lobbying of the packaging industry.

State Secretary Heijnen acknowledges the issue and pledges to address these findings in the upcoming law evaluation, particularly focusing on limiting the shift from hard plastics to soft ones. Environmental organization Recycling Netwerk Benelux stresses that they had forewarned about the legislation’s weaknesses and suggests that stronger action could have been taken if these warnings were heeded.

This article explained the situation pretty well. They used a lot of different sources to support their arguments. They even asked a politician what her opinion on this topic is. They also explained some solutions that need to happen if they want to solve this problem.

I think this article is good in giving the different sides of the story. They talk about the environment but also about what the effect is for companies and why they are making the decisions they are making now. I think they stated good by the facts.

https://nos.nl/artikel/2495191-van-bakje-naar-zakje-bedrijven-ontwijken-regels-wegwerpplastics