Eurostat’s data as of 2014 revealed all markets followed by Balkan Green Energy News underperform overall European waste management achievements, except Slovenia, which is above average in recycling. Albania was excluded from the latest report.
The mean rate of recycling is 28% and Slovenia tops it by 21 percentage points. In comparison, Montenegro, Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey and Bosnia and Herzegovina reuse only up to 1% of waste, while literally all the rest goes to landfills, against the continent’s average of only 28% for landfilling. The share of total composted and incinerated municipal waste in the treated volume was 16% and 27%, respectively, while Slovenia reached 12% and zero in the two categories, the same as Cyprus. Romania is reported to compost and incinerate 11% and 2%, respectively, while it recycles only 5%. The rate of recycling in Cyprus is 13% and Croatia is two points higher, but it composts only 2% and does not incinerate.
Greece recycles 16% of municipal waste and composts 4%, but it does not incinerate. Bulgaria’s rate of recycling is at a solid 23%, but only 2% in composting and incineration. Data for Romania, Montenegro and Greece date from 2013, while information for Cyprus is an estimate which may be revised.
The only figure for Kosovo* is an estimate of waste generated per capita for 2012, 417 kilogrammes. The European average is 475 kilogrammes, with 465 treated. Cyprus generates and recycles 626 kilogrammes, trailing only Denmark and Switzerland. Greece and Montenegro generated 409 and 408 kilogrammes per capita, respectively, in 2013. The treatment rate in the former was 100%, while the reading for the latter was 89%. There was 442 and 432 kilogrammes of municipal waste per capita in Bulgaria and Slovenia, respectively, while the figure for Turkey was 405. In Bulgaria, 416 tonnes was treated, while Slovenia fared the worst by relative amount treated, only 257 tonnes per capita. Turkey treated 363 tonnes.
Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Serbia generated and treated, in that order, 387 (374) tonnes, 370 (370), 349 (234) and 302 (236) tonnes. Data for Romania show 254 tonnes per capita were generated, the least in Europe, while 214 tonnes of municipal waste was treated.
* This designation is without prejudice to positions on status and is in line with UNSCR 1244/99 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.
October 25, 2022
