In Montenegro, only slightly more than one percent (1,17%) of municipal waste is recycled, according to the data of the Monstat Administration for Statistics from the document Actual and processed waste in 2020.
With this, Montenegro has not fulfilled its strategies outlined ten years ago, because the percentage of recycling should already be over 20 percent, and the goal of the European Union is for it to be over 55 percent at the level of its members by 2025.
Last year, 304 thousand tons of municipal waste were generated in Montenegro, of which 3,55 thousand tons were recycled. There was a similar ratio in 2019, when there were 340 thousand tons of municipal waste, of which 4,03 thousand tons were recycled.
Municipal waste, according to Monstat's methodology, means waste generated in households or during activities that are similar in properties to waste generated in households.
Last year, municipal companies took over 268 thousand tons of municipal waste that was stored in sanitary or ordinary landfills, while about 30 thousand tons of waste ended up in various other places because, according to Monstat, 13 percent of households in Montenegro are not covered by municipal waste removal services .
489 kg of garbage per inhabitant per year
According to these data, the average Montenegrin citizen creates 489 kilograms of waste annually, or 1,3 kilograms per day.
The European Union's 2018 "circular economy" goals stipulate that at least 2025 percent of municipal waste be recycled and composted by 55. The average at the level of EU countries from 2018 was 46 percent of municipal waste recycling. In that year, Germany had the highest percentage, which recycles as much as 68 percent of municipal waste, followed by Austria and Slovenia with 58 percent. Malta had the lowest percentage of recycled waste, only six percent.
According to the Law on Waste Management, adopted by Montenegro in 2011 and amended in 2016, it was foreseen that the amount of recycled waste - paper, metal, plastic and glass - would gradually increase from year to year in order to recycle 2020 percent in 50. of these raw materials from the total volume of waste.
According to the Waste Management Strategy from 2015, it was stated that 2013 percent of municipal waste was recycled in 2,6, but the source of this data was not specified.
At least 22 percent of the waste should have already been recycled
According to the analysis from the strategy, paper makes up 12,3 percent of municipal waste, glass 11 percent, plastic 10 percent, plastic packaging 4,7 percent, composite packaging 4,5 percent, metals 2,5 percent,... That is, in various types of paper, plastic, glass and metal make up about 44 percent of municipal waste, the recycling of which is provided for by the Law from 2011.
If Montenegro had worked to meet the goals it had set for itself in previous years, last year it should have recycled 50 percent of paper, plastic, glass and metal. This would mean a share of 22 percent of the total municipal waste, not 1,17 percent.
According to the percentages from this strategy, Montenegro annually throws away, buries in the ground or scatters in its rivers, sea, mountains and fields about 55 thousand tons of different types of plastic, 35 thousand tons of paper, 33 thousand tons of glass, 7,5 thousand tons of various metals. .. While in total it processes only 3,5 tons of all types of this waste, and according to the law, at least half or about 65 thousand tons should be processed.
The largest part of communal waste, 35 percent, is organic waste, i.e. food scraps or other waste of plant and animal origin. In developed countries, it is separated and composted, that is, turned into organic fertilizer.
The remaining share of municipal waste is wood and textiles with 2,6 percent each, inert waste (gravel) 2,7 percent, green waste 0,8 percent, hazardous waste 0,6 percent, and other types totaling six percent. Also, the types of this waste are mostly recycled or used in other ways in the EU countries.
By 2035, no more than 10 percent of waste will go to landfills
Open landfills are a thing of the past in most EU countries, and the new goal is to reduce waste storage in sanitary underground landfills to no more than 10 percent of the total by 2035. The current average at the EU level is that 24 percent of municipal waste is stored in these landfills.
Countries that already store one percent or less of municipal waste in underground landfills are Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Finland, the Netherlands and Belgium.
Millions in landfills and landfills
According to data from the Staregia on municipal waste adopted in 2015, in 2013, 244 thousand tons of municipal waste of various types were generated, of which 2,6 percent or 6,3 thousand tons were recycled.
According to the official estimate, there were 30 thousand tons of paper in the total thrown waste, and according to the price list for the purchase of secondary raw materials of the Podgorica landfill, the purchase price of one ton of paper costs an average of 20 euros. So that year, waste paper worth about 600 thousand euros was thrown away.
Four thousand tons of non-ferrous metals (aluminum and others - cans) were thrown away. The purchase price of a ton of cans (which is the lowest price for non-ferrous metals) is 300 euros, so this waste worth about 1,2 million euros is thrown away annually.
PET packaging (plastic bottles) was thrown that year in the amount of 13 thousand tons. The purchase price per ton is 100 euros, so this waste is thrown away worth 1,3 million euros per year.
That year, 29 tons of plastic were thrown away, the average purchase price of which is 30 euros, so about 870 euros of this raw material was thrown away.
20 thousand tons of glass were thrown away in Montenegro that year. In Montenegro, it is not possible to find purchase prices for glass because it seems that no one buys it. Purchase prices in the region are from 4 to 5 euros per ton, which for this quantity amounts to 80 to 100 thousand euros.
That is, from these four types of waste alone, four million worth of waste was thrown that year.
The costs of recycling itself are higher, but municipal utility companies are paid for waste removal, and EU buying and processing cents also have significant subsidies.
The industry produces 343 thousand tons of hazardous waste
According to Monstat data, a total of 1,3 million tons of various waste is generated annually in Montenegro, of which 763 thousand tons come from industry, 187 thousand from construction, 119 thousand tons from service activities, 230 thousand tons from households,...
Of the total amount, 343 thousand tons are hazardous polluting waste, mostly from industry, 317 thousand tons and 26 thousand tons from service activities.
Out of the total amount of waste, 80 thousand tons are recycled, mostly industrial waste. That is 6,15 percent of the total waste.
The law from 2011 also predicted that Montenegro would recycle 2020 percent of construction waste in 70.
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