Recycling target fears:

Drastic improvement is needed to reach 50pc rate by 2020 as incinerators work harder than ever

THE amount of rubbish being recycled by households has gone into reverse, official data show, making the UK unlikely to meet its targets by 2020. England’s recycling rate, including composting, fell by 0.3 per cent to 44.8 per cent in 2017-18, compared with 45.1 per cent in the previous year.

The UK has a target under European Union rules to recycle at least 50 per cent of waste generated by households by 2020, meaning drastic improvement will now be required.

Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary, was expected to announce an overhaul of the recycling system last month. However, it appears to have been delayed because of the continuing Brexit crisis.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs figures also showed that waste sent for incineration increased by 0.7 million tons in 2017-18 to 10.8 million tons, with 42 per cent of all local authority waste now being sent for incineration.

Slightly more of the waste that is being sent to recycling plants is being recycled, with some 45.2 per cent of household waste recycled in 2017, up just 0.3 percentage points up on 2016’s figures and rising only around one percentage point in five years.

The amount of “dry” materials such as paper and card, glass, plastic and waste electrical and electronic equipment being recycled fell 2.1 per cent in 2017, while the collection of separate food waste increased by 8.7 per cent on the previous year.

David Palmer-jones, chief executive of Suez Recycling and Recovery UK, said: “These statistics show the country has been languishing in the recycling doldrums for the past five years, after more than a decade of hard-won behavioural change.

“The lack of progress is a reflection of the challenges facing the global recycling market; cuts to consumer communication and domestic political activity being focused on other areas.”

He said the marginal improvement for the calendar year 2017 was undermined by the figures for the 12 months to March 2018, which came just after the effective closure of China as the world’s largest market for recyclate.

Martin Tett, the Local Government Association’s environment spokesman, said: “The best way to boost recycling is to prevent unrecyclable waste from entering the environment in the first place.

“Councils are keen to work with supermarkets and manufacturers so that they can switch to recyclable packaging where possible.”