GRTU welcomes new exemptions from eco-contribution for businesses

GRTU said today in a statement that it was pleased to note that the Ministry for Resources and Rural Affairs had once again issued applications for exemptions from eco-tax, in line with a legal notice that lists which products are liable for exemption.

“GRTU has consistently been requesting the issue of this application as from 1^st September 2010. We have also insisted with government to increase the products liable for exemption for authorised scheme members,” the GRTU said, which runs its own waste recovery scheme, Green MT.

“ The last part of our demand seems to have fallen on deaf ears. We shall of course continue to insist on this matter as the only way that authorised schemes can survive is by private industry paying according to the polluter-pays principle, and not by indirect taxation, which is what the eco contribution is actually today.”

The GRTU, which collects recyclable waste on behalf of its member importers and manufacturers, is a critic of the flat-rate eco-contribution, which it calls “the most haphazard ‘environmental tax’ ever to be burdened on a select number of the business community at large in Malta and Gozo.”