Penetration of environmentally friendly products

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Topics: Household consumption ,

Assessment made on 01 Jan 2001

Note: new version is available!

Dec 21, 2011 - Municipal waste generation (CSI 016/waste 001) - Assessment published Dec 2011

Generic metadata

Classification

Household consumption (Primary theme)

DPSIR: Response

Identification

Indicator codes

Geographical coverage:

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Contents

Policy issue: Are households using more environmentally friendly products?

Key messages

Eco-labelling is helping consumers choose 'greener' products ranging from organic food to energy-efficient appliances. Take up, however, is growing unevenly from a small base.

Figures

The European food market for organically poduced products, 1997 * Finland: 1999 data

Key assessment

The market for 'green' products is very uneven - organic food, for example, accounts for just 1.5% of all EU food sales, while class A and B refrigerators increased their market share from 15% to 20% during the mid-1990s.

Take up of eco-labelled products also varies from country to country. Sweden, for example, more than doubled the number of available eco-labelled products in the second half of the 1990s, during which class A washing machines took a third of the market and other class A and B appliances made similar gains.

While organic food is growing in popularity everywhere, it has the biggest foothold in Germany, followed by Italy, France, and the United Kingdom. Consumption in southern Europe is relatively low.