Drinks in plastic bottles fear

The EU would not grant a derogation to Malta to maintain the ban on mineral drinks in plastic bottles, Alternattiva Demokratika's spokesman for EU Affairs, Arnold Cassola said yesterday.

"Malta should introduce compensatory policies to make up for the fact that permission would be granted to use plastic bottles for mineral drinks upon EU accession," he said in a statement.

It is estimated that over 80 million such bottles would end up as waste in the environment.

"EU technocrats were all in favour of a derogation for Malta on the use of glass bottles for mineral drinks. Malta is a typical example of very limited territory which has huge problems in waste disposal. That is why they were so much in favour of giving Malta a derogation on clear environmental grounds.

"Unfortunately, the politicians from at least five EU countries opposed the derogation, on the grounds that it distorted economy and the free market competition.

"AD strongly urges the Maltese government to introduce an eco-tax on plastic bottles in order to discourage the sale of minerals in them. This would help the environment and safeguard hundreds of jobs that would otherwise be threatened if soft drink companies opted to import ready made soft drinks in plastic bottles instead of bottling them in Malta."

He said that AD would bring up this issue again in the European Parliament once the summer recess is over.