Local authority associations want a consensus text on the circular economy

The associations of local authorities welcome important advances in the field of consumer information or extended producer responsibility, but also call on parliamentarians to remove several major blocking points, in particular concerning the deposit for recycling plastic bottles, to mobilize all players in the circular economy.

After 18 months of work, the bill for the circular economy will make it possible to significantly improve consumer information, fight against the destruction of unsold goods, promote eco-design by eco-modulations, and develop new ones. extended producer responsibility chains, in particular in the building sector.

Nevertheless, the associations of local authorities (AMF, AdCF, APVF, ANPP, Urban France, Villes de France, AMORCE and CNR) wish first to point out the absence of a relevant and suitable response to the fight against illegal deposits, then express their concern about the consequences of a hasty decision to implement a recycling deposit in 2023, which would demobilize all public and private players today in charge of selective collection and recycling of packaging by that date. They therefore hope that the commitments of the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister will be faithfully and precisely transcribed, as well as the agreement on the method reached on November 25 which gave priority to the existing systems and conditioned the implementation of the deposit agreement of associations of communities.

With regard to the major environmental, but also social, societal and economic challenges of this law, associations of local authorities also want the best of each version voted by the Senate and the National Assembly to be retained for:

• give more resources to local authorities, in particular in the fight against illegal deposits;
• fight as effectively as possible against the proliferation of non-recyclable plastic waste (which goes far beyond the question of packaging and plastic bottles only);
• concretely and in the short term encourage re-employment;
• maintain the timetable for setting up the new EPR supply chains and gradually generalize the principle of circular economy for the millions of orphaned consumer goods from any recycling, reuse and reuse sector;
• remain open to all essential and reliable organic and energy recovery solutions.

The objective is to prevent and reduce the production of waste, as well as to minimize disposal without waste recovery in accordance with the European regulatory framework; such disposal is harmful to the environment and increasingly costly for the French because of the upcoming increase in environmental taxes.