skip to content
My Green Pod Logo

China bans ‘foreign garbage’

UK recycling faces crisis as China bans plastic waste imports
China bans ‘foreign garbage’

A Chinese ban on the import of plastic waste poses major challenges for the UK’s recycling industry, which ships more scrap to China and Hong Kong than any other destination.

Household plastic recycling banned

British companies have shipped more than 2.7m tonnes of plastic scrap to China and Hong Kong since 2012 – nearly two-thirds of the UK’s total waste plastic exports, an Unearthed analysis of customs data reveals.

But China has announced it will stop imports of ‘foreign garbage’ from early next year, saying it found imported recycling material was contaminated with ‘large amounts of dirty wastes or even hazardous wastes’.

The rules appear to include tough quality standards for industrial plastic scrap, and a total ban on plastics from household recycling.

‘Instead of confronting our growing problem with throwaway plastic at home, we have been shipping it off to places like China where it’s easier for us to ignore. Now that China has decided they’ve had enough of our waste, it’s obvious that the UK’s recycling system simply can’t cope with the mountain of plastic waste we generate. It’s time to stop kicking the plastic bottle down the road and finally get to grips with the problem at source.’

ELENA POLISANO
Oceans campaigner for Greenpeace UK

A recycling crisis?

Recycling industry sources told Unearthed the ban threatens to tip Britain’s already stretched recycling sector into crisis, as a chronic shortage of capacity to recycle plastics in the UK collides with the near-total closure of the world’s biggest market for waste household plastics.

Councils may be forced to stop collecting some kinds of plastic for recycling, and the situation could endanger the UK’s ability to meet its recycling targets.

‘We urgently need two things to happen – investment in recycling infrastructure to ease the pressure, and a serious plan to prevent plastic production from continuing to grow. That means developing sustainable alternatives to single-use, disposable plastic products, and the way to encourage innovation in this area is to hand full responsibility for the products to the companies designing them.

‘That means companies like Coca Cola not just making, filling and selling their bottles, but collecting, storing and recycling them afterwards. We’re confident that once they’re in control of the full life-cycle of their products, they’ll accept that they’re using the wrong material and switch to better, and cheaper, alternatives.’

ELENA POLISANO
Oceans campaigner for Greenpeace UK

Waste companies are pursuing new export destinations for plastics, but are also considering temporarily burying plastic waste, incineration, landfill and even converting it into jet fuel.

Environment secretary Michael Gove told MPs last month, ‘I don’t know what impact it will have. It is… something to which—I will be completely honest—I have not given sufficient thought.’

The full Unearthed report, with data on export volumes and responses from industry, politicians and environmental experts, is available here.

Click here to find out more about the supermarkets and drinks giants that lobbied against recycling rules.

Here's more related content

Sorry we don't have any suggested related content at the moment. Please check back later.

Join The Conversation

Leave a Reply

Here's More Ethical Home & Garden News & Features

  • All
  • B Corp
  • Black Friday
  • Christmas
  • DRS
  • EVs
  • Heroes
  • activism
  • activists
  • air pollution
  • animals
  • app
  • battery
  • butterflies
  • cars
  • circular economy
  • cities
  • citizen science
  • climate action
  • climate emergency
  • coffee
  • community
  • compostable
  • conservation
  • consumer
  • consumerism
  • cooking
  • drinks
  • economy
  • electric cars
  • emissions
  • energy
  • energy bills
  • equality
  • ethical business
  • extreme weather
  • fires
  • food
  • food waste
  • garden
  • gardening
  • gifts
  • global warming
  • green energy
  • green homes
  • green jobs
  • greenwash
  • growing
  • hair care
  • health
  • home
  • housing
  • inequality
  • insects
  • kitchen
  • litter
  • microplastics
  • money
  • motoring
  • natural skincare
  • nature
  • oceans
  • organic
  • packaging
  • pesticides
  • pets
  • plastic
  • plastic pollution
  • plastic-free
  • policy
  • politics
  • pollinators
  • pollution
  • preloved
  • recycle
  • recycling
  • refill
  • renewables
  • reuse
  • rivers
  • sewage
  • sharing
  • shopping
  • skincare
  • solar
  • supply chain
  • tech
  • transport
  • waste
  • water
  • water quality
  • weather
  • wellbeing
  • wildlife
  • wind
  • zero waste