Romania could enter the procedure of infringement for not reducing the amount of waste by 50% until 2020, which will result in penalties up to €200,000 per day in 2021, while the taxation at the pit of 80 lei per tonne of waste has been suspended by the Government until 2019, says the Coalition for Circular Economy of Romania.
“The Emergency Ordinance 48/2017, issued Friday evening by the Romanian Government has entered into force immediately without prior public consultation, amending and supplementing Ordinance 196/2005 regarding the Environmental Fund. The Emergency Ordinance 48/2017 suspends the application of pit waste charge until January 1st 2019. This forced measure, after just a few months of normality, stating that pit storage is no longer penalized until 2019, will have devastating effects on the environment, on Romania’s position in the European statistics and on this coutry’s recycling efforts”, reads the Coalition, quoted by Agerpres.
According to the source, the surprising position of the Ministry of Environment, “which seems to have forgotten that its primary obligation is to protect the environment and Romania from infringement penalties” has the direct effect of accelerating the filling of the already saturated and scarce landfills, the destruction of thousands of hectares of land and groundwater damage, leading, ultimately, to “burring Romania under a mountain of garbage.”
“During the hearings in the Parliament, the Minister of Environment said that “we are concerned for the citizens to not pay if they are not informed and do not know what to do”, although, occupying the same position as Minister of Environment in 2015, he stated that “the fee will be introduced in order to align Romania with the European standards – “de.eu zero”, meaning that any product which becomes de.eu will rejoin the reuse circuit and become again raw material. „This ordinance tolerates, in the detriment of Romania’s environmental concerns, municipalities inability to provide separate collection infrastructures, allowing them to throw all the waste in the pit, including recyclable resources”, says the Coalition for Circular Economy of Romania.
In their view, the Ministry of Environment should ensure that all local authorities are implementing consistent environmental measures: from the selective collection of municipal waste to penalising those throwing waste in an uncontrolled manner.
The fee of 80 lei per tonne, which aims to reduce the amount of waste deposited, encourages selective waste collection and recycling, chapters in which Romania ranks lowest in the European Union, came into force from January 1st 2017, after a delay of 3 years.
The Circular Economy Coalition of Romania considers that through the suspension of this penalty, Romania is heading in the opposite direction of the European Circular Economy package approved by the Senate through Resolution No. 3/2016 and all of this would cancel the efforts to divert the submission of waste at the pit and the increase the recycling.
“We are the only country in the EU that encourages waste disposal. It is an undeniable evidence that introducing this penalty measure and gradually increasing its value in all Member States, has led, with no exception, to an increased reuse and recycling level of municipal waste, creating jobs and resources for the economy. Switching to the objectives on resource efficiency set out in this year’s roadmap could create over 34,200 new jobs. In fact, at the moment, by encouraging storage, infringement for not reducing the amount of waste by 50% until 2020 cannot be avoided and starting 2021 Romania will pay up to €200,000 euros/day, “reads the Coalition.
The Coalition is a private initiative, apolitical, open to all actors involved in circular economy. The Coalition is not yet a registered legal entity. Coalition members offer volunteer support through expertise and resources in order to set a common ground regarding the implementation of circular economy in Romania. 106 companies have joined this private initiative, with a total of over 14,000 employees and an annual turnover of five billion lei.