Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein)
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47. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government whether his Department intends to introduce a requirement for the publication of annual, material-specific recycling data under the Whole of Government Circular Economy Strategy 2026-2028, in order to improve monitoring of progress towards national and EU recycling targets. [68030/25]

Alan Dillon (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the competent authority for the collation of and reporting on waste and recycling data on an annual basis in Ireland. It compiles national waste statistics from various sources which are used for official reporting, policy development, and public information. The EPA is also responsible for the collection and annual reporting of national waste statistics. This includes data on municipal waste generation and treatment, such as material-specific recycling rates. This data is used to track Ireland's progress against European and national waste targets.

The forthcoming second Whole of Government Circular Economy Strategy (2026-2028) will make the business case for the circular economy setting a holistic vision, supporting practices such as eco-design, repair, reuse, recycling and re-manufacturing.

The strategy will set sectoral actions and targets covering aspects such as reductions in resource use and increases in reuse/repair. The monitoring framework will include metrics that measure those target areas (e.g. material consumption or virgin material use by sector, reuse/repair rates) so that Government can track each sector against its associated actions and targets.

The Public Consultation on the Strategy closed in early November and my officials are now reviewing the submissions with a view to publishing the Strategy early next year.