Italy garbage dips with virus lockdowns, but plastics rise

ROME (AP) — Italy produced 10% less garbage during its coronavirus lockdown, but environmentalists warn that increased reliance on disposable masks and packaging is imperiling efforts to curb single-use plastics that end up in oceans and seas.

Italian researchers estimate that during the peak months of Italy’s lockdown in March and April, urban waste production fell by 500,000 tons. That decrease is enabling dumps in Italy — where trash collection in major cities has often become a hot-button political issue — to absorb the 300,000 tons of extra waste from protective masks and gloves estimated to be used this year, according to the Italian Institute for Environmental Protection and Research.

“Substantially, the figures will balance each other by the end of this year,” Valeria Frittelloni, the institute’s head of waste management and circular economy, told The Associated Press.

But the pandemic dealt a blow to efforts to move away from single-use plastics in many places where they were just beginning to become mainstream. U.N., Greenpeace, Italy’s Marevivo environmental organization and other such groups are warning that continued reliance on single-use plastics will pose longer-term risks to the environment.

That’s particularly true for a country with a long coastline along the Mediterranean Sea, which is plagued by the tiny bits of broken-down plastic known as microplastics.

“We don’t have an estimate yet of how much of those objects were dumped in the environment, but what is sure is that all those that have been abandoned sooner or later will reach the sea,” said Giuseppe Ungherese, head of anti-pollution campaigns at Greenpeace Italy.

After years of reducing reliance on products like plastic bags and cutlery, in line with European Union directives, Italy saw a huge spike in plastic use...