The EU policy for a plastic economy: reflections on a sectoral implementation strategy

After reviewing the main EU policy documents on the plastic waste issue, this work conceptualises an analysis framework to investigate farmers’ attitudes to market-based tools (i.e. subsidies, tax-credits and pay-back mechanisms in EPR schemes) through which the introduction of an operational scheme for a better management of their plastic waste can be incentivised in line with the 2018 European Strategy for Plastics in a Circular Economy. A total number of 1,783 farmers responded to a purpose-built questionnaire. Results show that most of the plastic waste they produce is piping and packaging and that tax-credit represents their most favoured incentivising tool.