ZAGREB, 19 April 2022 - Economy Minister Tomislav Ćorić on Tuesday visited the Premifab company in Zagreb which recycles and processes hazardous waste and returns 95% of it into production.

Premifab cofounder Igor Podravac said the company used hazardous waste to make a solvent and that it was totally CO2 neutral, without any harmful emissions.

In Croatia, the company mostly covers the pharmaceutical and automobile industries as well as the production of food packaging. It generates 35% of its revenue in the region, cooperating with the car industries of Serbia and Slovenia, the Slovenian pharmaceutical industry, and several companies in Italy and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Ćorić said the company was a good example of the circular economy Croatia needed, notably in the processing of hazardous as well as other types of waste.

He said 1,600 tonnes of solvent waste from various companies arrived in Premifab every year, where it was processed so that 95% was returned to senders in the form of a solvent that could be reused.

"In this way, Premifab participates in Croatia's waste management system in the best possible way," he said, adding that it also reduces the import of solvent waste.

Premifab will next invest HRK 80 million in a new, much bigger plant in Ivanić Grad, Ćorić said, adding that it is the only company in Croatia regenerating solvent waste.

He went on to say that incentives for electric cars could be increased this year and that he was sorry the transfer to a circular economy and renewables was not more dynamic in the years when it could be done without major shocks.

Ćorić is confident the energy crisis will cement the orientation to green energy in Croatia and elsewhere in the EU in the long term, and that incentives will be increased next year for including renewables in industrial production as well as among private clients.

ZAGREB, 12 April 2022 - Participants in a "green" regatta on Monday removed abandoned waste from beaches and the seabed around the island of Šolta.

During the cleanup, over 700 kilos of waste was collected and most of it was plastic, which poses the biggest threat to marine life.

The "Cleaning Sailing Race Regatta", held on that Adriatic island off Split, included 12 divers who removed the waste from the seabed.

The partners in this campaign are the Split-based Sunce association and the Biotherm cosmetics and healthcare items brand.

Gabrijela Medunić Orlić, the executive director of the Sunce association, said that nowadays, public beaches are kept in good shape by local utility companies, however, other beaches are often full of litter and the utilities do not have enough workers to clean them up.

ZAGREB, 15 Feb 2022 - The Green Action NGO on Tuesday welcomed the decision by Zagreb City authorities regarding waste collection, saying this was a big step in the right direction enabling fairer bills, more recycling and less waste delivered to the city's Jakuševac landfill.

"Finally fairer bills and a better waste collection service in Zagreb," the environmental protection NGO, which was once led by the incumbent Mayor Tomislav Tomašević, said in a press release.

The proposed decision brings a new model of waste collection under which bins will have locks so they cannot be accessed by third persons.

"We consider this to be a good move which we have advocated for years because better supervision will enable fairer waste separation so the percentage of recycling will be greater. This has been proved successful in many cities across the EU such as Ljubljana, which has been dubbed the European capital of cleanliness," the NGO said.

As far as billing is concerned, the proposal introduces partial payment based on the quantity of waste and the more citizens separate waste the lower their bills will be.

That is certainly a much fairer way to charge for waste collection than the current system of charging per square metre and the number of household members.

One of the challenges of the proposed model is supervising the use of official bin bags and identifying and penalising irresponsible citizens.

"That will require stepping up municipal inspections and introducing additional reward models...We also expect our proposal for bags for mixed waste to be replaced with appropriate smaller containers and waste meters, to be adopted soon," the NGO said.

ZAGREB, Sept 6, 2020 - Croatian and Slovenian divers joined forces on Sunday as part of an environmental drive called "Cleaning Without Borders" to remove underwater waste in Savudrija Bay, the subject of a long-running border dispute between the two neighboring countries.

Over 150 divers from throughout Croatia and about 30 of their colleagues from Slovenia took part in the clean-up, removing dozens of bags of solid waste on both sides of the bay - in Piran, Savudrija, Veli Joze campsite, and Kempinski beach.

About 20 children participating in the 5th International Children's Diving Eco-Patrol also made their contribution.

"Drives like this are praiseworthy and that's the direction we should all be going for the environment," said the Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development, Tomislav Coric.

The main objective of the drive was to clear the sea bed of waste as well as to draw attention to the global problem of sea pollution and raise public awareness of the importance of preserving the flora and fauna of the Adriatic Sea, Andreja Vedrina said on behalf of the organizers, Promocija Ronjenja.

"Projects like this contribute to the good neighborly relations which Croatia and Slovenia have fostered for many years, while the clean-up drive itself contributes to the preservation of the underwater world of the Adriatic Sea," Slovenian Environment Minister Andrej Vizjak said in a video message.

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