International Review of Waste Management Policy - Department of ...

collection facilities and the application in almost all Flemish municipalities of pay-byuse
charges. 964 To the extent that pay by use may have had some impact, this may
prove to be a one-off impact. Furthermore, the apparent change in trend could also
be attributed to the positive attitudes to waste management of the population.
These results could also be confirmed by the situation in Luxembourg which has seen
an overall stabilisation of household waste generated despite no taxes or bans having
been implemented. 965966
In the UK, it is difficult to be clear whether the landfill tax, which has escalated
significantly in recent years, has had a strong impact upon waste prevention. In the
household sector, it seems reasonable to argue that the tax will have had little or no
impact upon household waste growth for the simple reason that there is no means of
conveying, to the householder, the changing cost of disposal other than through a flat
rate increase in the Council Tax levied locally. Notwithstanding this, municipal waste
growth rates have been in decline since 2000, though much of this may be
attributable to the effect of the LAS, which has generated an incentive for local
authorities to minimise the quantity of non-household municipal waste which they
collect. 967
The situation for non-household waste from commerce and industry is almost
certainly very different, only partly because revenues from the tax have been recycled
into schemes designed to foster increased resource efficiency (with prevention and
re-use being prominent in these). However, the quality of the available data does not
inspire one to suggest that a basis for any trend analysis exists, let alone, that the
basis for discerning a clear change in trend due to the tax is reliable. Rather, the
evidence is more anecdotal, and where surveys of commercial and industrial waste
have been carried out, quite suggestive. In addition, a report by ECOTEC following the
tax’s introduction suggested that, on the basis of a survey, the tax had been a key
factor leading some businesses to reappraise their waste management behaviour. In
964 A. Sanders, l. Putseys and E. Van Der Putten (2004) Beheer van afvalstoffen. Chapter 2.17. In
Milieurapport Vlaanderen (MIRA), www.milieurapport.be
965 Luxembourg Ministry of the Environment (2006) Waste Statistics Website, Accessed on 16 th
October 2008, http://www.statistiques.public.lu/stat/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=1036
966 EIONET: European Topic Centre on Resource and Waste Management (2007) Luxembourg Waste
Factsheet, Accessed 16 th October 2008,
http://waste.eionet.europa.eu/facts/factsheets_waste/Luxembourg
967 It is important to recognise that in the UK, and indeed, several other EU countries, municipal waste
is defined as, effectively, an administrative category. The quantity of waste regarded as ‘municipal’
depends upon whether the waste is collected by, or on behalf of, the local authority. Decisions by local
authorities to collect, or not collect, commercial waste will influence the quantity of municipal waste
reported. This – the difference in the way the definition of ‘municipal waste’ is applied - is a key reason
why a) EU statistics regarding municipal waste are essentially non-comparable, and b) attempts at
cross-country analysis of the effectiveness of policy instruments are likely to be thwarted unless
account is taken of the way instruments and definitions are applied in different countries (and such
studies are rare, if not, completely absent).
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