24.03.2010
 
The following is an excerpt from the Bank of Israel Annual Report which will be published in April:
Waste Treatment and the Landfill Tax
 
For the full report in Hebrew - Click here
 
  Israel lags far behind the advanced countries in waste treatment. About 87 percent of waste in Israel is landfilled, compared with an average of 40 percent in the EU.  
  A policy has been activated recently in Israel to reduce the share of waste that is landfilled. The landfill tax and the principle of producer responsibility provide an incentive for local authorities and producers to recycle and to reduce the amount of landfill.  
  Compared with the levels in other countries, the landfill tax in Israel is low, and its success depends on the effectiveness of other measures, in particular subsidizing the infrastructure for waste separation at household level.  
Waste treatment is one of the areas in which Israel lags far behind other countries. About 87 percent of municipal waste is landfilled, a poor solution from both the environmental and the economic aspects; in the EU the figure averages about 40 percent, and in some countries, e.g., Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden, it is as low as single digit figures.  
Many economic and environmental problems arise as a result of the quantity of waste and the lack of proper waste management––land allocated for waste landfill, the costs of conveyance, air pollution, pollution of land and water sources, greenhouse gas emission, and the waste of resources. In contrast, the marginal cost to households of producing waste is minimal, so that there is no incentive for them to reduce its quantity or to recycle it. Furthermore, the general policy in Israel has the opposite effect of making recycling costly (in terms of time and effort).  
There are many alternatives to waste landfill: reducing the amount of waste produced, re-use, recycling dry waste (paper, plastic, glass, etc.), producing compost from wet waste (organic waste), and even the production of energy. All of these are preferable to landfill, but they are also more costly and require the cooperation of several elements such as producers, households, local authorities and recycling plants. The interdependence of these elements in the waste treatment chain, the high transition cost and the uncertainty regarding its success constitute a critical barrier to a move from the current situation to one with a significant recycling market.  
 
 
The landfill tax was introduced in 2007, with the object of reducing the amount of waste buried. The tax is paid by the local municipalities for the burial of municipal waste, and it is due to rise to NIS 50 per (metric) ton, which is about 12 percent of the cost of waste disposal and less than 1 percent of local authorities' expenditure. A landfill tax is used widely in the advanced economies. The average level in Europe is about 40 euro per ton (correct to 2004), which is about 50 percent of the cost of waste disposal. Studies of the effect of the tax show that it depends on its being part of a comprehensive policy to reduce landfill, and it can be effective only if it set at a very high level. Currently two main steps are being promoted in Israel to support recycling. The first is using the money raised from the tax to subsidize the investment in infrastructure needed for separating waste at the household level, which is the only way to a significant reduction in landfilling. The second is using the principle of producer responsibility, which makes producers and importers responsible for the amount of waste they put into the market, and for recycling a certain percentage of it. This principle is applied with regard to tyre waste and bottles, and is expected to be applied also to packaging.