TOMRA marks 50th anniversary by highlighting urgent need to accelerate circular economy

In marking its 50th anniversary, Norway-based recycling machinery provider TOMRA has announced a new mission aiming to accelerate the transition to a circular economy.

TOMRA’s ambition also includes enabling 40 per cent of plastic packaging produced globally to be collected for recycling by 2030. Currently, just 14 per cent of all the world’s plastic packaging is captured for recycling, with just two per cent recycled in a closed loop. 

President and CEO Tove Andersen said: "We live in a world that needs big transformation. We urgently need to accelerate the circular economy and make more efficient use of resources – opportunities that TOMRA’s solutions can help address. TOMRA has a fifty-year heritage of innovation and impact, with the proven solutions our customers – and the planet – really need. These past fifty years have prepared us to rise to the most pressing challenge of our time: reinventing the way the world manages waste. We strive to lead the resource revolution, and our team of resource revolutionaries around the world are up to the challenge."

The company has also set the goal to collect 500 billion containers annually for Clean Loop Recycling, the company’s version of closed-loop recycling. This is so that they can become new packaging products as well as reduce reliance on raw materials. 

Harald Henriksen, EVP and Head of TOMRA Collection, added: "Our work to enable a world without waste is at the heart of enormous challenges in sustainability impacting the entire globe – such as the need to combat climate change, plastic pollution and food waste, and drive a circular economy.