Packagers of products such as bleach, electronic toys, drugs, aerosols and paint-items that would be considered household hazardous waste-would be required to mark their packages with a special symbol that indicates such products shouldn't be thrown away. Instead, leftover products and/or packages must be put in special collection bins, either at designated local facilities or in-home bins for curbside collection, depending on the country and locale. Further, packagers who are required to use the symbol must pay into an EC fund that's set up to finance curbside collection. Seven of the 15 EC countries currently have such collection infrastructures in place. The household hazardous waste draft covers 18 categories of products and may take several years to go into effect.
More EC export regs
North American exporters to the European Community (EC), who already must contend with some 20 different packaging laws, may face yet another EC mandate, currently under consideration by the European Commission, according to Recycling Laws Intl.
Apr 30th, 1997
