Turkey Is Europe’s Trash Heap

The European Union exported 33.0 million tonnes of waste to non-EU countries in 2021, according to Eurostat, a 77 percent increase since 2004.

As Statista’s Anna Fleck details below, Turkey was the primary destination country for EU waste last year with some 14.7 million tonnes sent there – three times as much as in 2004.

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India received the second highest quantity of EU waste that year, receiving some 2.4 million tonnes.

It was followed by Egypt and Switzerland, with 1.9 and 1.7 million tonnes, respectively.

Eurostat reported that the volume of waste being sent from the EU to China has fallen considerably in recent years, declining from a peak of 10.1 million tonnes in 2009 to 0.4 million tonnes in 2021.