Croatia News - CroatiaPress.com

Zagreb, February 3 (CP) – Croatia has reached a milestone in the plastic bottles recycling realm, as it recycles two billion bottles over a little more than two years and tops the European list of bottle recyclers.

The Environment Protection Ministry has announced that in 25 months since a new regulation on plastic packaging had come into force, it has been established that all of the plastic packaging that had been put on the market had actually been brought back for recycling.

This puts Croatia at the very top of the list at the European level regarding the ratio of plastic packaging put in circulation and that recycled.

However, this effort does have a downside to it. Although there exist 60 companies authorised for gathering used plastic packaging, since each of the pieces ensures a return of 0.50 kuna to the individual returning it to collection point, this creates a daily unsightly scene of people down on their luck, mostly pensioners with meagre monthly incomes, making this their side business and picking through garbage in an attempt to find plastic packaging that had been thrown away.

There must be a better way of securing that all those who wish to recycle are given a chance to do so without having to pick through garbage. See-through garbage cans specially put in for plastic packaging to be disposed of in them may be a viable solution.