EN 13432 Standard

Following the development of the EU Directive on Packaging and Packaging Waste (94/62/EC), an EU harmonized standard for compostable and biodegradable packaging - EN 13432:2000 – “Packaging: requirements for packaging recoverable through composting and biodegradation”- was introduced in 2000. It was adopted by national standards bodies in many of the European Union Member States, for example published as BS EN 13432 by the British Standards Institution, the ‘BS’ prefix meaning ‘British Standard’. Its scope is specifically compostability and anaerobic digestability of packaging. Packaging products that conform to the ‘compostable’ criteria of the relevant standard are suitable for composting (the tests simulate industrial scale composting conditions) and those that conform to it’s anaerobic digestion criteria are suitable for that method of organic recovery.