Parliament adopted the new law on waste management with overwhelming majority. Through this a modern legal background was created, establishing transparent and verifiable legal background to enhance the amount of waste recovery and expand the responsibility of manufacturers in using low-waste technologies in production. The law shall enter into force 1 January 2013.

The comprehensive reform of waste management became necessary in Hungary, in order to comply with EU regulations on waste collection and recovery. The new law introduces pricing by authorities from 1 January 2014, thus waste management public services can only be done as a non-profit activity. Pricing will be determined while taking into account the recommendations of the Hungarian Energy Office (EH).

The law also introduces a tax on disposing waste, which will be paid by the company and the amount will vary according to the amount and type of waste and will increase annually until 2016. The revenues obtained will be used for waste management tasks by the Ministry of Rural Development. This measure is already used by the neighbouring countries, such as the Czech Republic, Slovakia, or Poland.

Regulation son the separate collection of household waste will enter into force in 2015. The primary goal is waste prevention and if that is not possible, then facilitating recycling and re-use more types of waste, in order to decrease the amount disposed. The new law creates the conditions for these, following European Union directives and also prohibits bringing any hazardous waste for disposal, household waste for disposal and any residues arising from its incineration into Hungary.

(Prime Minister’s Office)