The Usable Packaging project has issued an open letter to European institutions, namely the European Commission, calling for better recognition and support for the bioeconomy.

Underscored by CEO of Google Eric Schmidt’s declaration that the “next big thing is the bioeconomy”, the letter highlights its growth across Europe and draws attention to discrepancies in legislative support.

It makes the following recommendations to the Commission:

  1. Relaunch the Bioeconomy Strategy along the lines of the ambitious programme laid out by the Finnish Government. “The (Finnish) strategy’s measures are divided under four headings: a. Higher value added from bioeconomy, b. A strong knowledge and technology base, c. A competitive operating environment and d. Usability and sustainability of bioresources and other ecosystem services. The strategy also includes sector-specific measures.
  2. Recognise the value innovative industries producing biobased and compostable materials offer to Europe and avoid the offshoring of this production to Asia and the USA. This includes promoting the use of agricultural wastes and by-products as feedstocks as well as new sources such as seaweed, waste CO2, fungi.
  3. Recognise the advantages biobased and compostable plastics can bring to ensure clean food waste collection systems and develop the infrastructure for composting and digesting food waste alongside certified compostable materials. This leads to reduced costs for citizens and reduced dependence upon landfills and incinerators.
  4. Mandate the obligatory use of biobased and compostable materials in applications in which traditional plastics can only ever be contaminants (e.g., food waste collection bags, teabags, sticky labels, non-aluminium coffee pods and bags, catering ware in closed loop situations)
  5. Promote policies which ensure market space for innovation in materials manufacture. Closing marketplaces to innovative materials, as mooted by the Commission, stifles research, investments and only benefits non-EU nations which have no such restrictions.
  6. Promote clearly identifiable labelling to help avoid cross contamination of compostable plastics into traditional plastic recycling and of plastic into food waste collections. One of the biggest cost burdens that food waste processors face is extracting and disposing of non-compostable plastics entering their processes.
  7. Promote consumer communications, as BIOREPACK is doing in Italy alongside the plastics consortium COREPLA, to develop public understanding to ensure compostable plastics are truly collected and recycled back through composting to soil. BIOREPACK reports over 50 per cent recycling rate in its first year of operations. That should be a 2030 target for the EU.

To read the full letter, click here.