Reference is made to the statement issued by GreenPak on 17 September 2021 claiming that WasteServ is withholding payments due to GreenPak Coop for the delivery of separated waste. 

WasteServ categorially denies these claims and contrary to what is being stated it is GreenPak Coop that has refused payments that according to WasteServ are due for the delivered recyclables. So much so that WasteServ will now proceed to deposit this amount in Court. 

Private operators, like GreenPak, deliver recyclable material – consisting of paper, cardboard, plastic and metal – to WasteServ and are then paid for the said recyclables and charged for rejects. Rejects are wastes that cannot be recycled. 

In view of the apparent low quality of the delivered materials, two separate exercises to identify the exact rate of rejects were held by WasteServ in February 2021 and again in June 2021. This is being done to ensure that the schemes are paid for what they actually deliver. During these exercises it was found that the rates of rejects for the scheme in question were 33.48% and 27.2% respectively. This means the during the exercise held in February 33kg out of every 100kg that were being delivered were materials that could not be recycled, and when the same exercise was repeated in June 27kg out of every 100kg were rejects. 

Rejects identified during these exercises included a vast range of materials ranging from clothing, bulky items, organic waste and also alarmingly dangerous materials such as clinical waste, dead animals, highly flammable substances/devices and other similar materials. Included together with this press release are a few images of the problematic materials/rejects. 

Paying for the delivery of such reject material is clearly not an option as the state operator would be subsidising its own failure. This would drain WasteServ’s human and financial resources leading to shortcomings that will have long term impacts on the country’s environmental performance. 

The above dynamic is not the only problematic aspect in the relationship between WasteServ and schemes. In fact, the National Audit Office has in February 2021 found a number of other areas that require improvement. The NAO specifically singled out the differences between the fees payable to the Schemes for depositing recyclable waste at WasteServ and the revenue generated from the sale of this material. On this WasteServ has already concluded the required studies so that the necessary discussions on potential solutions can commence. 

WasteServ continues to stress its determination to further improve Malta’s standing when it comes to waste management and once again thanks the general public, its workers and all the stakeholders involved in the waste management industry, as 2021 will go down in the history book as the one with the largest ever amount of recycled materials – 18,000 tonnes.