NEWS | Wednesday, 26 September 2007

Eco Tax refunds on 2006 packaging

The recent revisions in the eco-contribution regulations and MEPA requiring companies to register as producers of waste packaging by the end of September the justification for eco-contribution is again being questioned.
MEPA obliges companies trading any packaged goods to provide details on how discarded packaging arising from their trade has been recycled in 2006. This is no problem for companies that form part of the GreenPak authorised compliance scheme, but others may not be faring so well and could be fined for not meeting their packaging waste obligations.
Whilst eco-contribution is paid on certain consumer goods including beverages, toiletries, detergents and other packaged products, many traders believed they could sit back and do little else. This is not the case and with recent revisions to the regulations requiring the payment of eco-contribution on imports even before the packaging becomes waste, the issue gets even more complicated.
Law abiding and environmentally conscious companies have since last year been helping GreenPak divert packaging waste away from landfill and towards recycling. In 2006, the GreenPak system well surpassed the national recovery targets and is again on course to repeat this achievement in 2007. So much so, that many companies are claiming back from the Ministry of Finance money paid as eco-contributions during 2006.
An importer of many leading brands of toiletries said, “While a consumer pays 5c ecotax for a shampoo bottle, the GreenPak fee for the same item is 4mils. So companies like ours that are members of the scheme are currently paying 5c4 but once we get the ecotax refund the cost of compliance would be just 4mils”. He added that by delaying the granting of refunds, it could be argue that the government is keeping prices from going down. “In fact it makes more sense if companies like ours who have been part of GreenPak for a long time, are exempted from paying this tax. We are doing more than our fair share to protect the Maltese environment by investing a lot of money to ensure that GreenPak continues recovering packaging on our behalf”.
GreenPak is part of the European wide Green Dot organisation that is responsible for diverting millions of tonnes of discarded consumer packaging away from landfill and towards recycling.
Companies can make use the various services offer by the scheme by completing the necessary forms available on the GreenPak website at www.greendot.com.mt.