Waste: common rules to apply to shipments to non OECD countries

The Committee adopted the draft recommendation by Ivar VIRGIN (EPP, Sw) on the common position by the Council on establishing common rules and procedures for shipments to certain non-OECD countries of certain types of waste. Of Parliament's ten amendments from first reading, the Council had incorporated six amendments in the common position. The rapporteur took the view that a new annex C proposed by the Council should be deleted as the ban on exports of the types of waste listed were already covered by present lists of waste (Annex VIII of the Basel Convention) and that yet another list complicated what was already complex legislation. Charity organisations had expressed concern that the Regulation might make it more difficult or impossible to export secondhand clothes for further use to third countries. Mr VIRGIN stressed therefore that neither this Regulation nor Regulation EEC 259/93 would create obstacles to exports of clothes for re-use as long as the exporter complied with the national rules of the importing country. The rapporteur also urged the Commission to review the waste definitions relating to the export of clothes for re-use in order to avoid any future misunderstanding. �