Recycling: A Global Issue

On 18 March, the Global Recycling Day took place with initiatives in many countries. Like every year, the Global Recycling Foundation – which supports the promotion of recycling, and the recycling industry, across the world – nominated #RecyclingHeroes to honor people, places, businesses, and activities that have championed recycling efforts. As emphasized by founding President Ranjit Baxi, recycling is an essential part of the fight against climate change. It promotes global sustainability, especially since it is projected to save more than a billion tons of CO2 emissions by 2030.

Recycling is a significant global issue for many reasons, and progress is being made in reducing waste as well. This demonstrates an increasing number of countries with a national waste management and a recycling industry. However, there are limits, particularly when it comes to recycling plastics. The organi­zers of the international trade fair K 2025 (8-15 October in Düsseldorf, Germany), used the Awareness Day to take a closer look at the advances, challenges, and necessary changes within the plastics industry. Regarding recycling as a collective effort, the organizers concluded that the Global Recycling Day “serves as a reminder that recycling alone is not enough – a functioning circular economy requires collaboration between industry, policymakers, and consumers. Companies must invest more in innovative recycling technologies, while policymakers should establish clear legal frameworks and financial incentives.

Consumers also have a role to play: Making more conscious purchasing decisions and improving waste separation significantly contribute to success. Only if all stakeholders work together can recycling become a true success story.” This applies also to the worldwide trade of secondary materials, for example recycled steel (steel scrap). As one can learn at every convention of the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR), the delivered volumes are significant. In the first half of 2024 alone, the USA exported 7.197 million tons (-16.4 percent year-on-year); biggest buyers were Türkiye, Mexico, Bangladesh, India, Taiwan and Canada. In the same period, the EU-27 sold 7.359 million tons (-18.7 percent) abroad. Therefore, BIR underlined in a Position Paper the importance of free trade for the global recycling industry. Moreover, it outlined the negative impact of current trade barriers on recycled materials and highlighted the connection between the trade of these materials and sustainability.

Equally important for the success of recycling is the right equipment. For material handling, there is a solution: the SENNEBOGEN 850 G Series (page 37). The new HAMMEL pre-shredder VB 850 DK (page 36), the new Ecoglass equipment from PICVISA (page 39) and sorting solutions for metal separation from Eriez (Page 40) and Redwave (Page 42) are examples of the constant progress.

We hope you get a lot of new and useful information from reading this current magazine.

Yours, Brigitte Weber