BASF (Ludwigshafen / Germany; www.basf.com) has appointed WPO Polymers (Seville / Spain; www.wpopolymers.com) to distribute its “ecovio” film product range for certified compostable shopping bags, organic waste bags, and fruit and vegetable bags in Spain and Portugal.

The agreement, said BASF, will better position both companies to accelerate business and support food companies and retailers in complying with Spanish Royal decree 293/2018, which transposes the EU Plastics Bag Directive into national law and mandates the use of compostable bags (with a thickness of less than 50 microns) that are certified according to European standard EN 13432.

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Mia Pettersson, head of BASF’s Specialty Polymers global business unit, said the reason for choosing WPO Polymers was its technical expertise in extrusion and in-depth knowledge of recycling and plastics materials, which complemented BASF’s customer-focused strategy for ecovio in Spain.

“The cooperation will also allow us to support the separate collection of organic waste, as high-quality compost is important for climate change mitigation,” Pettersson said, noting that Spanish legislation on the use of plastic bags has tightened step by step since 2018, with the country’s biopolymers market expected to become one of the largest in Europe.

“With the inclusion of BASF’s innovative biopolymer into our portfolio, we will both expand our established business and push the adoption of organic recycling in the Iberian Peninsula,” said Manuel Olaegu, CEO and founder of WPO Polymers.

BASF’s ecovio biopolymer is a blend of its “ecoflex” polybutylene adipate terephthalate (PBAT) and renewable raw materials. In May this year, BASF had majorly hiked prices in Europe for various grades of its ecovio brand bio-compounds (see Plasteurope.com of 07.05.2021).