Highlights - EFBW June 2015 meeting, Spa, Belgium

July 28, 2015

Watercoolers Europe is part of the wider community of the European Federation of Bottled Water (EFBW) which met in Spa in June.  It consists 23 national associations (including WE), 6 affiliated members and 6 direct members.  The topics discussed by the various committees were:

Technical and Regulatory Group:

  • Original purity
  • Nutritional and health claims
  • Fracking
  • Revision of the Drinking Water Directives
  • Filters and drinking water treatment devices

Environment Group:

  • Product Environmental Footprint (PEF)
  • Deposit Return System (DRS)
  • Water use ratio survey reporting that the European bottled water industry achieves 10% gain in water efficiency.

Health Group

  • EFSA’s scientific opinion on dietary reference values for water:  Importance of water for maintenance of basic physiological functions such as thermoregulation, physical and cognitive activities
  • Publication of a brochure “Guidelines for Adequate Water Intake” available from EFBW.
  • Representation by EFBW at the symposium of 12th European Nutrition Conference (FENS 2015) in Berlin 20th – 23rd October.

Tax Group

  • Review of European and international challenges for the different taxation of bottled waters and the draft bill to increase taxation on bottled water in France.

Communication Group

  • Provision of early alerts to national associations
  • Engagement of stakeholders and Members of European Parliament (MEPs)
  • Publication by EFBW of a brochure entitled “Natural Mineral & Spring Waters – The Natural Choice for Hydration”.

The Statistics
Market figures were presented by Canadean, showing that the EU, with 28 markets and 505.7 million population had a bottled water consumption of 105 litres per person in 2013, with an estimated revenue of €12.4billion, supporting more than 883,000 jobs and 53,000 bottled water producers.

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