Once again, we present in this report ECOTIC’s operating and management results for the year 2022, but this time we do it presenting those of both the ECOTIC Foundation and the recently launched ECOTIC Entidad Administradora S.L., a new non-profit company we already informed you was due to be created a year ago. With it, we can move forward and extend our commitment to the circular economy, bringing new synergies to our operations and more added value to our member producers and partners.

Internally, we have been working for some time to shape our future with the aim of increasing our environmental commitment. ECOTIC, through its management entity, aims to contribute to the improvement of this mission by broadening the types of waste to be managed by means of its range of solutions and by drawing on ECOTIC’s extensive experience in environmental management. In an increasingly aware but still far from optimal context, we have a lot of work ahead of us if we are to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations 2030 Agenda.

Precisely in relation to the fulfilment of the SDGs, it is worth highlighting the improvements that the entry into force of the new Law 7/2022 on waste and contaminated soils could bring for a circular economy aligned with the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC) 2021-2030. This Law is part of the structural reforms set out in the European Commission’s Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan and allows us to channel the Next Generation aid that is already being granted today and that can be an important lifeline for many companies to cope with the damage entailed from COVID-19, accelerating their recovery and maintaining and creating jobs.

The purpose of the Law is to transform the current linear economic model into a circular model through economic incentives, the prioritisation of waste prevention and the extension of the proximity principle in waste recovery.

The new law also provides for the application of the extended producer responsibility regime for certain waste streams through the development of regulations that will regulate this for single-use plastic products and packaging, wet wipes and balloons; tobacco filters and fishing gear; textiles, furniture and furnishings, and non-packaging agricultural plastics. For packaging, it is extended, as well as to household packaging, also to industrial and retail packaging.

In line with this new regulation, at ECOTIC we see an unavoidable need to offer management solutions for all packaging categories, in order to provide a comprehensive service affording operational synergies to our member producers. Thus, we plan to apply for the corresponding authorisation as an EPRCS for the management of packaging by the end of the year, carrying out the operational management through our administrative entity.

With regard to sensitisation actions aimed at the business world, it is worth highlighting our firm commitment to continue supporting the Sustainable Digitisation campaign that we are promoting together with the CEOE Foundation, the Extended Producer Responsibility Collective Systems that make up OfiRaee and the SEUR Foundation, which, in its second edition, has continued to promote and manage the donation, reconditioning and delivery of computer systems to entities that generate new opportunities for persons at risk of exclusion, reducing the digital divide and waste generation and extending the useful life of the systems. We are determined in our efforts to raise awareness among companies of the importance of donating equipment and giving it a second life among the most needy groups. And, in this line, it is also worth mentioning our participation in the CIRCULAR PLACE initiative, promoted by Ambilamp, which is explained in detail in this report.

With regard to the management of ECOTIC itself, just one year ago we remarked that we had exceeded the figure of one million tonnes of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) financed and managed through our EPRCS since its inception in 2005. A year later, we are closing FY 2022 having increased this figure to over one million, one hundred thousand tonnes managed.

The rate of increase in the quantities managed in recent years continues to position us as a benchmark management system at both national and European level and demonstrates the great job being done by our team in collaboration with the 1,034 producers who put their trust in ECOTIC to properly manage their waste, a figure that has increased by 19.5% this year compared to the 867 member producers in 2021. This increase is partly due to new requirements for the import of electrical and electronic equipment, batteries and accumulators, and strict controls by the SOIVRE inspection service to ensure the proper management of WEEE.

In this chapter on management, special mention should be made of the great work being done by distributors, installers and waste managers, as without them we would not be able to achieve these high material recovery and valorisation figures.

These successful alliances between the different agents involved in waste management have led to an increase, compared to 2021, of more than half a million tonnes of CO2 equivalent in avoided greenhouse gas emissions, which, added to our historical figures, amount to a total of almost ten million tonnes.

I would like to finish off by saying a sincere thank you to all the people who, in one way or another, participate and work with us in making our purpose their own: to make our planet a better place for future generations.