Waste Management Services 2013
Waste Management Services 2013 The OECD Competition Committee debated Waste Management Services in October 2013. This document includes an executive summary of that debate and the documents from the meeting: a background note, written submissions by Canada, the Czech Republic, Estonia, the European Union, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Peru, Poland, Romania, the Russian Federation, the Slovak Republic, South Africa, Sweden, Chinese Taipei, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, the United States, BIAC as well as an aide-memoire of the discussion. Technological and policy changes have altered the economics of waste collection and treatment. Landfills are further away from cities and larger. More waste is diverted towards treatments that allow to re-use it, recycle it, or to recover energy from it. Secondary raw materials derived from recycled waste are being increasingly sought afters, as primary raw materials are becoming scarcer and more expensive. Producers have been made responsible for the products they have put on the market at the post-consumer stage of the products’ life. All these changes are raising new competition issues, some relative to the conduct of firms operating in the markets for the management of waste, some raised by the ever-increasing amount of environmental legislation. This legislation is aimed at protecting the environment and the health of citizens, but may sometimes raise unnecessary barriers to competition and thus reduce the incentives towards efficiency. This Roundtable examines recent developments in the management of municipal solid waste and discusses the experience of competition agencies in addressing the competition implications of these changes.
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