A complex system of tariffs and duties is holding back innovation and the growth of the circular economy in Europe, says beverage giant Coca-Cola.
Ulrike Sapiro, Director of Sustainability at The Coca-Cola Company, was speaking at a Financing the Circular Economy event, hosted by the Dutch Embassy in London last week.
She said that the roll-out of the company’s plant-based packaging has been hindered in Europe by the convoluted duties and tariffs and called for its simplification.
Coca-Cola launched the first edition of its PlantBottle packaging, which it says is a fully recyclable PET bottle containing up to 30 per cent sugarcane-derived material, in 2009. Last year, at the 2015 Milan Expo, the company unveiled an updated version made entirely from plant-based PET.
According to Coca-Cola, over 35 billion of the 30 per cent PlantBottles have been produced since 2009, with the product being used for 30 per cent of the company’s packaging volume in North America and seven per cent globally. However, Sapiro stated that further expansion of the product has been held back by international trade and duty tariffs that favour more traditional materials and processes.
She points to the fact that Coca-Cola’s importing of a plant-based chemical, bio-MEG (monoethylene glycol), needed to produce the packaging, from Brazil to Europe ‘adds 5.5 per cent of tariffs and duties on the price of plant-based material being used here’, while virgin oil-based material does not have the same levels of duty.
Sapiro called for action on removing these barriers if innovation in the circular economy is to blossom. She said: “There needs to be systematically a conversation to start eliminating the duties and tariff barriers on the sort of new materials that will help us on the journey to a circular economy.
“Bioethanol for the production of fuel... is often subsidised. Bioethanol for material use, for example PlantBottle, is not. And that is really a pity because if it is recycled, bioethanol contained in PlantBottle can have a much longer life in the economy than bioethanol in the combustion engine.”
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