Ten years have passed since the European Commission (EC) published regulation No 282/2008 on the use of recycled plastic materials in food-contact applications. Now, the EC is planning "fast-track" approval for more than 100 recycling processes positively evaluated by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA, Parma / Italy; www.efsa.europa.eu), with approval and adoption as early as 2019.

In 2017, several organisations including Plastics Recyclers Europe (PRE, Brussels / Belgium; www.plasticsrecyclers.eu), European Plastics Converters (EuPC, Brussels; www.plasticsconverters.eu), Petcore Europe (Brussels; https://petcore-europe.org/) and the European Federation of Bottled Waters (EFBW, Brussels; www.efbw.org) criticised the failure of the EC to authorise the use of recycled plastics in food applications – see Plasteurope.com of 20.10.2017 and 12.12.2017. The lack of EU approval has resulted in many years of legal uncertainty for European companies that are invested in recyclate for food-contact applications.

For instance, a number of food and beverage companies have joined the "UK Plastics Pact", which includes goals to increase recyclate in packaging and effectively recycle more plastic packaging – see Plasteurope.com of 04.05.2018. Recently, French packaging company Guillin (Ornans; www.groupeguillin.fr) and recycling group Paprec (Paris; www.paprec.com) announced a partnership to increase the amount of recycled plastics in Guillin's thermoformed PET and PP trays for food – see Plasteurope.com of 05.10.2018.