We inform you that the Council of Ministers has approved yesterday, at the request of the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO), the Royal Decree on Packaging and Packaging Waste, a comprehensive review of Spanish regulations in this area aligned with the objectives of the European Union and that will allow progress in the implementation of the Circular Economy and achieve the new packaging recycling targets for 2025 and 2030.

In addition, this new Royal Decree transposes Directive (EU) 2018/852 of the European Parliament and of the Council, the last of the four directives approved in 2018 to be transposed, and develops some of the aspects of EU Directive 2019/904 on single-use plastic products that apply to packaging. The new regulation promotes prevention in the production of packaging waste, reuse, especially of beverages, both in the HORECA channel and in the domestic channel; and separate collection with a view to recycling, especially to achieve the separate collection targets for single-use plastic bottles established in Law 7/2022, and to confirm compliance, with a view to the mandatory establishment of the deposit, return and refund system (DRS) in the event of non-compliance with the targets. Likewise, the extended producer responsibility system is also developed for all packaging and packaging waste, so that the producers affected assume the cost of managing this waste, taking into account that the financing provided by producers must be based on circular economy criteria.