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Financial Times

EUROPE, 10 April 2002 -- The European Union once spent billions building up and then eliminating mountains of beef and butter. It has fortunately found a more productive way of dealing with a new problem - the growing mountains of waste.

A directive passed by the European parliament on Wednesday will make manufacturers responsible for recycling their own electrical and electronic products. Although the stream of defunct electronic goods accounts for only 4 per cent of household waste, it is growing fast. It is also a large source of heavy metals and organic pollutants.

The law is the EU's latest attempt to implement the "polluter pays" principle. Two years ago it passed legislation making car manufacturers cover the cost of recycling old vehicles. This is the right approach: ultimately it is consumers who foot the bill.

Giving manufacturers the responsibility for passing on the cost to consumers has several advantages. It reduces, but does not eliminate, the incentive for households to dump old appliances and leave the disposal costs to the state.

The English countryside has recently been littered with abandoned fridges. Retailers, afraid of not being able to get rid of waste, have stopped taking away old appliances in return for new purchases. A separate law now requires the environmentally friendly disposal of fridges containing CFCs, for which there are few facilities in the UK. Local authorities are required to take away old equipment but they may charge for it.

The new law will clarify responsibilities. It will oblige local authorities to organise separate collection of electronic waste. Manufacturers and distributors would then be responsible for removing, processing and recycling the waste.

Initially, producers will be able to add an extra identifiable charge to new products to cover the later disposal costs of goods already in use. But eventually the costs must be part of the product price. This will encourage manufacturers to design goods that are cheaper to recycle.

Making manufacturers individually responsible for their own goods should promote innovation and drive down the cost of meeting environmental standards. That is why white goods makers such as Electrolux support the proposals.

There may be a need for temporary collective financing of the cost where recycling facilities do not yet exist. But when governments and the European parliament hammer out a final deal, they must ensure that individual producer responsibility becomes the rule across Europe. That is the only way to create a market solution to waste.