Single Use Plastic Directive – All you need to know

You may have seen the new ‘Plastic In Product’ logo on coffee cups recently.
We said we would do a blog post to explain exactly what it is and give assurances that our products still and always will be the most sustainable cups on the Irish market.

From July 3rd, 2021, to comply with EU law any single use paper beverage container placed on the EU market will be required to display the “PLASTIC IN PRODUCT” marking.

The EU Single Use Plastic Directive is aimed at litter, particularly marine litter, the label makes no distinction between non-recyclable, recyclable, or compostable cups, and makes no reference to how recyclable or compostable the cup is. As always, we recommend that any of our packaging be properly disposed of, ideally in a composting or recycling stream, and at the very least in a general waste bin.

We at Down2Earth Materials will continue to exclusively provide compostable paper cups that have been certified to EN13432 by TUV Austria or DIN CERTCO and have been tested and certified by Cré in the Irish market, or recyclable paper cups that have been certified AAA to be recycled with paper by Institute cyclos-HTP.

Our design staff can assist you with creating a new design or revising an existing design to be compliant, but if you are designing it yourself or using your own designer, keep in mind that the logo must be situated horizontally away from the drinking area and must be a minimum size of:

• Cups < 16oz – 1.4cm by 2.8cm
• Cups > 16oz – 1.6cm by 3.2cm

We hope this clears things up for you.