Taking out the trash
By : Roseanne Gerin
Pre-dawn divers scouring trash bins and recycling receptacles for glass bottles, cans and cardboard are a familiar sight on the streets of Warsaw and other major cities. To passersby, it often seems more discarded material is plundered from municipal recycling bins than is collected.
But despite this routine pillaging, environmental and recycling experts say modest gains have been made in municipal recycling during the past few years. Bartosz Zambrzycki, a waste management specialist at the Environmental Protection Ministry, even calls the dump divers Poland's "first line of recyclers."
One of the most valuable finds for bin searchers are aluminum cans, which bring zl. 1-zl. 2 per kilo at collection points, according to Recal, a Polish foundation that promotes aluminum can recycling. Recal estimates that the number of cans recycled has steadily increased from 7% in 1996 to 20% in 1999.
The collection of glass bottles and jars for recycling has also increased. Bogdan Korczewski, the general director of the Recykling Center, a glass recycling plant owned by the Huta Szkla Jaroslaw glassworks factory in southeastern Poland, said his firm collected 28,000 metric tonnes of glass in 1999 and 46,000 tonnes of cans in 2000. It recycled about 40,000 tonnes of glass last year.
Pre-dawn run: Making the early morning runs for Asmabel, a company that specializes in reusable trash
More to do
Still, these modest successes are not enough. While the collection of recyclable material continues to improve, legislators and government bodies have increased recycling efforts by pushing to adopt standards used in the European Union (EU), which Poland hopes to join in a few years.
As a result, the Environmental Protection Ministry introduced a new set of environmental protection waste management and producer responsibility acts last year to accelerate the country's recycling efforts. Lawmakers are debating the new legislation in the Sejm, which would boost recycling on a national level to bring Poland in line with the EU's green policies.
The EU's 1996 directive on domestic and commercial packaging waste, for example, sets recovery and recycling targets to be met by members in five years. It states that by 2001, 50-65% of each member country's packaging waste must be recovered, and 25-45% recycled. The directive also states that at least 15% of each different packaging material must be processed for reuse. At present, industry experts estimate that Poland recycles only 1-2% of all reusable packaging material, which includes glass bottles and jars, paper and plastic and aluminum packaging.
Heavy load: Hauling a fridge and washing machine through Warsaw's Plac bankowy.
Introduced to replace the country's environmental protection act, which has been in effect since 1997, the legislation came as no surprise since waste has been the "fashionable topic" among politicians for the past three years, after modest successes in air and water pollution cleanups, Zambrzycki said.
Industry observers expect the wide-ranging set of environmental protection and waste management acts to be passed on July 1 and take effect on Jan. 1, 2002. The legislation underscores the EU's environmental regulations on the collection and reuse of recyclable solid wastes as well as the collection of non-reusable material by implementing financial penalties for companies generating the waste. It would require domestic and multinational manufacturers of waste packaging, such as Unilever, Nestle and Agros, to remove a certain percentage of their waste products from the market each year or pay fines.
Assessing responsibility
Due to the modest gains in the collection of reusable materials, the limited availability of bins throughout the country, and problems with the separation of recyclable material, Zambrzycki said the ministry sought to resolve the country's recycling dilemma through the concept of "producer responsibility." This would require enterprises with products on the market to take back their waste or pay penalties. The idea, he said, is based on the "polluter pays" principle of EU environmental legislation.
Managing waste: Bartosz Zambrzychi at the Environmental Protection Ministry.
The new legislation would increase business for waste-removal firms that collect both recyclable and non-reusable waste products on behalf of the producers, Zambrzycki said. "If the producers don't have (their waste) collected, then they will have to pay the money ... to the local authorities to organize a separate collection and the cleaning of the recyclables," he said. As a result of the law, companies would pay fees to two or three big firms that would collect their waste on a national scale, he added.
The EU's directive on waste packaging would likely be reviewed and amended this year, Zambrzycki said, with higher requirements for recycled material since many member states have already reached the standards set by the 1996 law. Since Poland has requested a grace period, the ministry would establish a graduated criteria for industries until they reach these standards.
Although the legislation would regulate national environmental policy, waste packaging collection and recycling nationally, industry analysts said it will also affect gminas, or municipal administrative units responsible for arranging and financing local waste collection.
According to Zambrzycki, only about 200 of the country's 2,500 gminas have municipal collection points, while only "environmentally conscious" municipalities with additional funds run such programs in rural areas. But Zdzislawa Krzeminska, the chief specialist for municipal waste at the State Office for Housing and Urban Development (UMIRM), said that the current municipal waste law for gminas contains a provision that requires them to keep their areas clean. Even though recycling is a part of the cleanup effort, many gminas don't initiate such programs due to a lack of money. "Funds do not follow the tasks," she said.
Despite the shortage of funds, some gminas have started projects to increase recycling and bring the country into line with the EU's waste management rules. The Waste Treatment Plant (ZUO), a landfill owned by six gminas in Gdynia, has initiated a program to collect recyclable material from street bins.
Pending the receipt of funds from the European Union's ISPA (Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-Accession) program, which provides financial assistance to candidate countries to prepare them for accession, a recycling plant will be built in 2003 to process used glass, plastic, paper and other material. Sabina Kowalska, the manager of ZUO, said she has already seen an increase in people taking part in depositing recyclable waste in the bins.
Another recycling pilot program has been underway in Warsaw since last spring. Residents regularly receive special bags for paper, cans, and plastic and glass containers as part of the gmina's efforts to be more environmentally friendly, according to Zdzislaw Podkanski, operations director of waste collection agency Asmabel, which provides containers and collects recyclable material for the program. He said Asmabel also gave the gmina a 9% discount on its waste collection services.
Footing the bill
The amount of material that is recycled depends on the price of landfill services, Zambrzycki said. When the price of dumping increases, recycling becomes a more attractive option as companies that need to dispose of waste must pay two fees. These fees include one to the owner of the landfill and another to the National Environmental Funds, which receive money from companies that pay fines for any of their activities that affect the environment.
The funds also exist at the voidvodship and local government levels, meaning that 50% of the landfill fee a company must pay goes to the municipality's environmental fund in the area where the landfill is located. The municipality, in turn, can spend the money on building a landfill or buying recycling bins, but not for paying collection companies for their services, he said.
Fees charged by landfill owners are higher in large cities, Zambrzycki added, while the environmental funds' penalties range from zl. 8-zl. 100 per tonne, depending on the type of waste. For instance, disposal of hazardous waste from oil production costs zl. 90-zl. 96 per tonne, while the charge for recyclable glass or plastic packaging would cost zl. 11-zl. 12 per tonne, he said.
The legislation has been met with heavy lobbying by companies arguing that the administration should let them resolve the situation on their own and with a minimum amount of red tape. Michal Korkozowicz, the general director of Eko-Pak, an association of industries for packaging fillers and manufacturers, said his organization has negotiated with the government about the cost scale for recovering and recycling materials.
"It must be underlined that this is a very demanding regulation given the scope of Poland's recycling and given the development of the level of the economy and the awareness of communities," he said. "It's one more consequence of joining the EU and operating here. (The companies) look at it as an advantage, but at the same time there are some costs and responsibilities."
As a result, 16 companies have established and registered the first national packaging waste recovery firm called Rekopol to prepare for the act's passage. Their combined efforts will allow for the sharing of costs to collect their waste products and to possibly work with municipalities on recycling efforts. In the end, however, Korkozowicz and other experts say that manufacturers will pass on the charges for their collection and recycling activities to consumers by increasing the prices for their products.
Despite some industries' displeasure over the prospect of paying for their recyclable and non-recyclable waste material, industry experts believe the new legislation will boost municipal recycling activities through a trickle-down effect.
"(Recycling efforts) must grow because we're going to adjust ourselves to the EU (directives), and there will have to be appropriate recycling programs in the gminas," said Bogdan Korczewski of the Recykling Center. "The new law will encourage everybody to address the issue."
