South Korea Proposes to Revise Packaging Material Recyclability Grading Standards

In a notice published on Dec. 15, 2023, South Korea’s Ministry of Environment announced plans for the revision of the Standards for Rating Evaluation of Ease of Recycling Packaging Materials.

1. The Notice focused on the ‘recyclability’ labeling of the products at this time, meaning even if a product did not abide by the standards written in the Notice, it receiving the ‘bad’ marking would be the worst case scenario.
2. Most, if not all the changes were targeted at PET packaging for water and beverages.
3. The weight standards were set as below:
   • [Normal Resistance Bottle] L=0.403xWx(V/0.9)-0.375
   • [Heat Resistance Bottle] L=0.585xWx(V/0.9)-0.481
   • [Pressure Resistance Bottle] L=0.306xWx(V/0.9)-0.355
   • [Aseptic PET bottle] L=0.176xWx(V/0.9)-0.267
4. The name, content, and attachments of the Notice were all changed to include “weight and color.”

These changes are being made in accordance with the new requirements of the Act on the Promotion of Savings and Recycling (Act No. 19311) which takes effect on March 29, 2024 to add color and weight standards for the material and structure of packaging materials and the evaluation standard for ease of recycling.

Official source

Act on the Promotion of Resource Conservation and Recycling | National Legal Information Center | Statute > text (law.go.kr)