Romania may be sanctioned because of waste

According to the Brussels correspondent of Radio Romania, Carmen Valică, Romania could receive a reasoned notice from the European Commission, for not respecting the European legislation on waste.

Among the mandatory rules there is recycling, which in Romania is only by 1 percent, while the rest of the waste is deposited in landfills.

The notification that Romania is likely to receive would bring it closer to submitting the case to the European Court of Justice, requesting financial penalties.

According to the Brussels correspondent of Radio Romania, Carmen Valică, the European Commission is to request Romania that within two months it must transpose the European directive into national legislation of the waste management field.

The original date which this was due to happen was December 2010.

As Bucharest did not submit the confirmation of enactment of the required legislation in due time, it received a first warning, followed by the commitment that it will do so until April this year.

The step of the "reasoned opinion", which could be decided on Thursday, occurred because even this deadline has not been met.

If from taking this decision passes two months without the enactment of the European Commission to Bucharest, then the Commission may transfer the case to the European Court of Justice, with the request of charging financial penalties, charges for which there would be a second appearance in Court.

The concrete decisions mean enacting the national legislation of the European Directive on the waste matter, it inclusively refers to provisions such as including the principle of the "polluter pays" or the "effective implementation of waste recycling".

Romania is not the only country where the Commission had to intervene on the waste matter.

In January, the infringement procedure was open for 23 countries.
Of these only seven solved their problems.

Concerning Romania, the EU infringement procedure was initiated over the years on matters such as the operation of the 112 emergency dial number, the poor knowledge of the local authorities and especially the insufficient infrastructure.

The Act is at the Chamber of Deputies

"The law on waste is debated by the Chamber of Deputies, the Minister of Environment and Forests, and by 2013, Romania will recycle 50 percent of waste", Minister László Borbély said.

The causes for which Romania does not recycle more than 1 percent of waste, shown in recent studies, are the lack of concern for this matter, the poor knowledge of the responsibilities of local authorities and, especially, the insufficient infrastructure.

"Many municipalities do not undertake the waste management problem, the Minister of the Environment", László Borbély, said.

Thus, in many places, it was not developed an infrastructure for collecting and recycling the waste.

According to Radio Romania Actualităţi news reporter, Roxana Dumitrescu, the number of municipal waste deposit is insufficient, and half the population is not deprived of sanitation services.

"The law provides, and now we are on the final phase of control, a firs check in the city halls, since last year in July, each municipality must prove it collected selectively at least 15 percent of waste. "

"If not complied, then for every ton of waste that was collected selectively, the city hall mus pay 100 lei. As I was informed, about half of them have done their job, while the other half have not", Laszlo Borbely said.

The Minister of the Environment said in a statement that Romania has not yet received any official notification from the European Commission regarding the reasoned notice that it intends to send the Romanian authorities.

The only document on this issue consists of a formal letter of the rules on waste sent to Romania in February this year when the deadline for implementation of the directive - December 2010 - was exceeded.

László Borbély admitted that Romania has troubles with garbage recycling.

"We recycle less than 1 percent compared to other countries. Do you have any idea of how much does Belgium recycle? 94 percent. Well, we will not get to 94 percent in two or three years, but we have the commitment to reach 50 percent soon, in 2016 - 2017. "

"We allocate money, over one billion euros, that in every county by 2015 the system is set up ", the Minister of the Environment said.

The blame of the low performance in terms of recycling belongs mostly to the local authorities, Minister Borbély highlighted.

Romania wants to have an integrated system of waste over the next four years.

To achieve that, we have from the European funds alone nearly a billion of which were actually spent less over 2 percent.

Translated by: Iulia Florescu
MA student, MTTLC, Bucharest University