Page 40 - Plastics News November 2017

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

BIR council hears updates on China situation

t its 2017 autumn event, the Bureau of International with the White House and members of the U.S. Congress
ARecycling (BIR) International Environment Council among others, she added.
devoted its meeting time almost entirely to China’s Emmanuel Katrakis, the secretary general of the Brussels-
import ban affecting certain secondary raw materials. based European Recycling Industries’ Confederation
The Brussels-based organization met in mid-October in (EuRIC), said his organization’s response has included
New Delhi.
gathering information from members about the specific
During a panel discussion moderated by BIR President impacts of China’s policy, so the European Commission
Ranjit Singh Baxi, Robin Wiener, president of the can be armed with “hard data” when mounting its case.
Washington-based Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries IEC council members underlined the need for the global
(ISRI), said the latest policy developments in China reflect recycling industry to continue to work together on common
a multipronged strategy published in July 2017, the goals arguments and to encourage the involvement of China’s
of which include prohibiting imports of solid waste that manufacturers and consumers of imported secondary raw
entail “major environmental hazards and intense public materials, with several contributors to the debate saying
reaction” by the end of 2017; halting imports that can the import ban has the potential to be highly damaging
be replaced by domestic resources; greater customs to China’s own businesses.
enforcement; refinement of laws, regulations and related
systems; and bolstering increased domestic recycling. BIR Director General Arnaud Brunet focused on the lessons
that must be learned from recent policy developments in
China, calling on national recycling associations to watch
for “signals” of similar changes taking place in other
countries, “because we have to be ready,” he stressed.
Governments need to be shown the benefits of partnering
with recycling industry professionals, said Brunet, adding,
“because we have good practices; we are the good guys.”
Brunet is scheduled to travel to China in November, where
he hopes to meet key officials and to gain an understanding
of “the next step” and “where they are going.”

Michael Lion, president of Hong Kong-based metals trading
firm Everwell Resources, and chair of BIR’s International
Trade Council, emphasized that China’s President Xi
Jinping has taken “a very personal interest” in the
improvement of the country’s environment. The challenge
Wiener said self-sufficiency in scrap is “an important for recycling industry representatives, he said, is to gain
driver” for the Chinese government. She also said a access to people “at the highest political level” within
proposed 0.3 percent contamination ceiling for imported China and to explain “in a helpful and respectful way” how
materials constitutes “an effective ban” because, among the recycling industry can work with them to a solution
recyclers she has spoken on this issue, “no one thinks they that is “commercially and socially advantageous to them.”
can meet that threshold.”
In reviewing BIR activities at the level of intergovernmental
For the United States’ recycling sector, China’s actions organizations, its trade and environment director Ross
have the potential to affect $ 6.5 billion of annual exports
and 150,000 related jobs. Some U.S. municipalities have Bartley said a UNEP-Basel Convention Expert Working
stopped accepting certain papers and plastics in their Group is in the process of reviewing various annexes of
curbside collection programs, Wiener said, adding that the Convention that have relevance to scrap materials.
has been “a big force for us in raising this issue with the BIR is “in a good position” regarding this debate, not
U.S. government.” Meetings have already taken place least because it has “engagement in the Expert Working
Group,” he added.

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