EU Enforces 35% Recycled Content in Plastic Packaging, Industry Urged to Act

From 2030, the EU Packaging and Waste Regulation (PPWR) will require plastic packaging to contain up to 35 % recycled material. A new VDI ZRE short paper outlines how German plastic‑processing companies can meet this target by immediately increasing recycled‑content use, adopting digital tools such as the forthcoming Digital Product Pass, and strengthening cooperation across the value chain.

Current industry data show a shortfall of up to 860,000 t of recyclable plastic despite a 6.2 % rise in recycled‑material use to 2.4 million t in 2023. Overall plastic processing fell 8.5 % to 12.8 million t that year. Digitalisation in the rubber and plastics sector lags behind the industry average (index 1.9 vs 2.2), and more than half of firms are unaware of the Digital Product Pass. The paper identifies four levers for a circular economy: recycled‑content integration, biopolymers, digitalisation measures, and cross‑industry collaboration.