Waste may well be a sign of an improved economy and higher consumption trends but the lack of effort by the Maltese to reduce it shows - the island has become one of the EU's worst offenders in terms of the amount of domestic rubbish produced per capita.

According to Eurostat statistics issued yesterday, while member states were trying to reduce their waste stream, considered to be one of the most effective ways of controlling the problem, until 2007 at least Malta was moving in the opposite direction, increasing its household waste by almost 11 per cent in five years.

Two years ago, every Maltese individual produced 652 kilograms of waste, an increase of four per cent in just one year and a dramatic increase of 71 kilograms per person in five years. Denmark was the worst municipal waste producer with 801 kilograms per capita, followed by Ireland (786 kilograms), Cyprus (754 kilograms) and Luxembourg (694 kilograms).

At the same time, 93 per cent of all the local waste was dumped in a landfill in 2007, with just two per cent being recycled.

Though the situation is expected to improve considerably in the coming years as recycling plants, including Sant'Antnin, are put to full use, in 2007 Malta was among the lowest waste-recycling member states. The average waste recycled in the EU in 2007 stood at 22 per cent of all domestic waste, with certain countries recycling more than a third of all their waste, such as Germany (46 per cent), Belgium (39 per cent) and Sweden (37 per cent).

While 11 member states, including Malta had no incineration at all, the highest shares of incinerated municipal waste were observed in Denmark (53 per cent), Luxembourg and Sweden (both 47 per cent).

Eurostat said composting and recycling accounted for over half the municipal waste treated in Germany (64 per cent), Belgium (62 per cent), The Netherlands (60 per cent) and Austria (59 percent). Malta composted a mere five per cent of its waste in 2007.

Municipal waste generated in Malta

2002 - 543 kg per person

2003 - 581 kg per person

2004 - 625 kg per person

2005 - 624 kg per person

2006 - 624 kg per person

2007 - 652 kg per person

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.