Waste management in Italy - statistics & facts
ome Italian cities are famous for their visible waste management issues. Rome, despite its popularity with tourists, is a good example of this. One of the largest landfills worldwide and the only European landfill that made it into the ranking is located in the Italian capital. In 2020, Italy ranked as the third leading country in the European Union based on total waste generation, with a volume of approximately 175 million metric tons of waste produced, after Germany and France.
As for municipal waste management in Italy, the overall share of waste recovered or sent to biological treatment for waste sorting amounted to a total of around 50 percent. Although the volume of municipal waste in Italy's landfills has been decreasing considerably in the past years, 20 percent of the total municipal waste generated in Italy every year is still stored in landfills.
Waste disposal in Italy
Interestingly, despite being one of the EU's leading waste generating nations, Italy also ranked first in the EU for waste treatment by recycling in 2020, with a recycling rate of over 83 percent. Italy also disposed of one of the largest volumes of waste for energy recovery in the EU, although that represented less than six percent of the total waste generated in the country.As for municipal waste management in Italy, the overall share of waste recovered or sent to biological treatment for waste sorting amounted to a total of around 50 percent. Although the volume of municipal waste in Italy's landfills has been decreasing considerably in the past years, 20 percent of the total municipal waste generated in Italy every year is still stored in landfills.
