2023 was a year of significant challenges for the plastics industry.
As George Lysseos, Executive Director of the Association of Plastics Industries of Greece, underlined to “Naftemporiki”, “the future of the plastics industry is not clear. The ever-changing legislative framework governing our materials raises significant challenges and forces companies to spend a lot of time adapting to new regulatory requirements. For another year we will do our best to stimulate recycling, which is a structural pillar for the adoption of the Circular Economy. As long as the state adopts the proposals of the Environmental Protection Agency for the immediate improvement of waste collection and sorting procedures, by creating collective alternative management systems, recycling in Greece will be stimulated and there will be more materials available for reuse and reprocessing into new products.”
“We keep stressing to all the involved bodies and of course the state that the sustainability of the Greek plastics industry is important for the businesses in the area,” he added.
Lysseos emphasized that the adoption of an effective Circular Economy remains an ambitious perspective for the Greek plastics industry that is constantly creating new products and applications for effectively addressing environmental challenges. Also, a large part of research and development concerns the redesign of existing products with the aim of making them more easily recyclable. Plastics remain irreplaceable for many applications and products and have a leading role to play in ensuring the competitiveness of several industries in Greece and Europe.
The Association plans several actions for 2024 as well. The “Plastainability 2024” conference that will be held next November is proof that the plastics industry in Greece has placed sustainability at the heart of its operation. At the same time, it will continue the synergies with the academic institutions in the field of research, and with the involved bodies, trying to contribute to the development of solutions for common challenges and to offer his knowledge and expertise to the state in the effort to make the appropriate decisions that will help the sustainable development of the sector and the protection of the environment. The total contribution of the sector is estimated at 1.1% of Greece’s GDP, approximately 2 billion euros in the period 2019-2021, while supporting the employment of 43 thousand workers (0.9% of the country’s employment). In addition, the Greek plastics industry is among the sectors playing an important role in the country’s exports.
