(Strasbourg/05.10.2022) By a large majority, the European Parliament has voted to significantly lower the limits for highly toxic chemicals in waste, persistent organic pollutants (POPs), starting next year. This is essential to ensure that they are not recycled again and thus do not end up in new products, such as children’s toys or food packaging.

Manuela Ripa, MEP of the Ecological Democratic Party, comments on yesterday’s vote: “I represented my group during the negotiations on this law. It was important to me to regulate the limits in waste very strictly, what I made clear in the negotiation process with the Council and the Commission, because POPs harm humans, animals, and the environment for generations. They are highly toxic chemicals that remain in the environment for a very long time and gather in our food chain. In humans, they can cause cancer, and affect the immune, endocrine, reproductive, and cardiovascular systems. They pose a particular danger to children. I am therefore pleased that we have adopted stricter limits for five highly hazardous substances, such as PFOA and dioxins. In addition, new chemicals were also adopted to the list of pollutants.”

This regulation is an important step towards moving to non-toxic material cycles and not giving POPs a second life through recycling. “However, this is still far from enough! Because for me, in the interest of our health and especially the health of our children and our environment, toxic substances have no place in our products. We must no longer recycle any toxic material at all. I will continue to campaign for this!”, Ripa concludes.