Action call over scandal of Wales’ missing recycling
THE vast amount of plastics put out for recycling in Wales which there is no certainty what happens to has been exposed in a Western Mail investigation.
Our special report has shown the shocking lack of information that
public bodies are legally obliged to obtain and publish on what happens to the plastics they ship around the world.
When we asked the Welsh Government why it was not obligatory for councils to find out and make public what exactly happens to all our waste, we were told it was because the information could be “difficult to define”.
Councils insist the companies they use follow the guidelines, yet plastic packaging from Rhondda Cynon Taf was found among mounds of rubbish in the Malaysian jungle earlier this year.
When the discovery of the Welsh plastic in 20ft-high mountains of waste by TV campaigner Huw Fearnley-Whittingstall was revealed, the council was only able to say it was
“concerned and disappointed” and insist it followed the correct procedures.
In theory, councils should publish final destination certificates to show which recycling plants ultimately took their waste.
Yet because they often use companies that simply handle the waste before shipping it on elsewhere, and it is deemed too difficult to find out what happens to an individual shipment, they are able to file reports saying that their waste was sent to an “unspecified location” in a country.
In 2017/18, for example, Rhondda Cynon Taf sent 707.17 tonnes of waste to an unspecified location in Malaysia – and thanks to Huw Fearnley-Whittingstall we now know that it seems likely that at least some of this was simply dumped in the jungle.
If you look at the statistics for all Welsh councils reported on the wastedataflow.org website and My Recycling Wales that year, some 7,800 tonnes of plastic waste went to “unspecified” locations around the world – including Malaysia, The Netherlands and China.
That is only a small proportion of the 971,000 tonnes of waste put out for recycling in Wales that year, yet it is still significant.
Poland is another country where two Welsh councils, Newport and RCT, shipped waste while only saying that the final destination was “unspecified”.
It was reported last year, by Reuters, that Poland was fighting a string of highly-polluting fire of plastic waste.
The newswire said: “More than 60 fires took place at dumps in Poland this year [2018] and officials said many were likely to have been deliberately started so as to destroy illegal waste brought into Poland from other countries”.
Newport council assured us that its waste was correctly recycled. It was just unable to tell us where that happened or who did it.
Environmental charity Friends of the Earth said this simply was not good enough.
Bleddyn Lake, Friends of the Earth Cymru spokesperson, said: “As we all know, a lack of absolute transparency is usually the starting point for things going wrong.
“It surely can’t be that difficult to know exactly where all the recycling ends up.
“The Welsh Government should ensure that all councils and waste management companies are dealing with their waste and recycling in a transparent and suitable way that isn’t causing problems elsewhere.”
One council, Swansea, told us it didn’t even bother to report some
information it had because it only entered the minimum requirements into WasteDataFlow.
A Welsh Government spokesman said: “Around 95% of waste from Wales is processed in the UK, with the majority processed in Wales.
“We support WRAP [a charity that works with governments to help deliver policies on waste prevention and resource efficiency] to offer technical support to Welsh councils to meet our aims of moving towards zero waste.
“All waste processed this way is recycled within the UK.
“We are working to reduce the export of waste by supporting the use of materials sent for recycling in manufacturing through our £6.5m Circular Economy Investment Fund.
“The WasteDataFlow website is clear that councils are required to track their waste to its final destination as far as is practical.
“In some cases councils may have sent their material to sorting facilities which pool it together before sending it to multiple customers – so a final destination can be difficult to define.”
The spokesman added: “However, we are investing in data tracking to enable councils to better track where their waste is going.”
A spokesman for Newport council said: “Material originated in Newport and sent to Poland in 2017/2018 only amounts to a total of 54.15t as stated in the My Recycling Wales website.
“That material was exported by one of the reprocessors we were working with in 17/18 and it was recycled in its entirety; this amount represents only 2% of the total amount of plastic collected in Newport for recycling, with the 98% being recycled in the UK.
“Also, during 2018/2019 (data to be published in My Recycling Wales by Welsh Government) all plastic was recycled in the UK.”
Earlier this year, when its plastic waste was found in Malaysia, a spokesman for Rhondda Cynon Taf council, said: “Despite the council utilising the correct contractual procedures, with accredited recycling processors, this unacceptable discovery has occurred.
“The council is as concerned and disappointed as residents will be by this discovery.
“Since being made aware of this matter, the council has conducted a full investigation with the accredited company concerned.
“On the basis of these investigations, we can confirm that only a small proportion, less than 3%, of Rhondda Cynon Taf waste was exported.
“We are therefore able to reassure residents that their positive recycling efforts are not in vain.
“As a council we believe the work of this programme highlights the need for the UK Government to provide stronger regulation of this industry, to ensure that waste and recyclable materials are unable to be disposed in this way internationally.”
Friends of the Earth Cymru’s Bleddyn Lake added: “Recycling facilities must be situated in the UK – it’s not right to export our waste overseas.
“If the infrastructure was here then it would also help create hundreds of jobs.
“The overall answer obviously though is to drastically cut down the amount of materials such as plastic and paper we use in the first place.
“Even simple acts such as using a refillable coffee cup can help and this is where a proposed ‘latte levy’ in Wales could help.
“The companies who produce the products in the first place must be made to pay to deal with them after they have been used rather than the cost falling to councils and therefore to us as local tax payers.
“Let’s have increased transparency, let’s have action and let’s have it now.”