Mexico’s Polyethylene suppliers denounce oxo-biodegradable technology

01-Aug-14

Mexico’s three biggest polyethylene suppliers have denounced oxo-biodegradable technology in a letter to the country’s national association of supermarkets and departmental stores, as per Plasticsnews.com. “We consider that the use of degrading additives is not a sustainable way of tackling this issue [of waste management], as it has not been proven indisputably that materials containing such [biodegrading] additives really do biodegrade in landfills or can be recycled. In other words, degrading additives do not add value to plastic waste, including polyethylene waste,” the letter from Braskem Idesa SAPI, Dow Química Mexicana SA de CV and Pemex Petroquímica stated. In the letter, the trio of PE suppliers said they had written to ANTAD after becoming aware that some of the association’s members had been specifying the use of oxo-biodegradable additives in their PE shopping bags and packaging. “We believe that, together with the use of said additives, a message is being spread that [oxo-biodegradable technology] is environment-friendly, which confuses and deceives society and consumers, inducing them to dispose of waste inadequately, thus damaging the environment and efforts to recycle the material,” the letter’s authors wrote.