Incpen unconvinced on recycling rate increases

Incpen responded to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs' consultation that "just upping targets" was "not really exploring the whole issue".

Director Jane Bickerstaffe said "more work was needed" to improve the quality of recycled materials and find end markets for them.

"PRNs were set up to support reprocessing capacity, but this is less of an issue for some packaging materials, such as glass and metal, where collection and sorting is more pressing," she said.

There are also concerns about the data used to establish future targets, given that economic growth is forecast to decline over the next five years, which could impact spending.

"People forget that the amount of packaging used is dependent on the amount of goods people buy," said Bickerstaffe.

Incpen also called on the government to establish regular national surveys on the composition of the waste streams to generate better data.

The European Commission said, on the implementation of the Packaging Directive, that it would not be necessary to increase recycling and recovery targets beyond 2008 levels, because these would "remain valid well beyond then".

"In the UK, we've lost sight of the need to set recycling targets to sensible amounts," said Bickerstaffe.

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