Back How much plastic packaging waste do we recycle?

29 November 2018

© one photo/Shutterstock.com

In the EU, an estimated 42% of plastic packaging waste was recycled in 2016. In eight EU Member States, more than half of the plastic packaging waste generated was recycled in 2016. The highest recycling share was recorded in Lithuania (74%), ahead of Cyprus* (64%), Slovenia (62%), Czechia (59%), Bulgaria (53%), Slovakia and the Netherlands (both 52%) and Sweden (51%). In contrast, less than one third of plastic packaging waste was recycled in Luxembourg (33%), Hungary and Ireland (both 31%), Malta* (29%), France (26%), Finland and Estonia (both 25%).

 

Recycling rate of plastic packaging waste 2017

 

Compared with 2005, the recycling rate of plastic packaging waste increased by 18.4 percentage points in the EU (from 24.0% in 2005 to 42.4% in 2016). This trend is observed in all EU Member States with the exception of Estonia, where the recycling of plastic packaging waste decreased by 0.9pp compared with 2005.

 

Recycling rate of plastic packaging waste 2017

The source dataset is accessible here .

*2015 data

 

To contact us: estat-user-support@ec.europa.eu .