Geopolitical crises, volatile energy prices and fluctuating raw material markets are increasing the pressure on the packaging industry. In an interview with FACHPACK360°, Carolina E. Schweig, Managing Director of C.E. Schweig and graduate engineer in process engineering for paper and plastics processing, explains why plastics recycling must now be reassessed in this context — not only as a sustainability issue, but as a strategic factor for raw material security, security of supply and industrial resilience.
The current geopolitical tensions are once again showing how strongly raw material and energy prices react to crises. How is this being felt in the plastics and packaging industry in Germany?
What the industry is currently feeling above all is that it is vulnerable on several fronts at the same time. The Strait of Hormuz is not a marginal issue, even if the average citizen may not have had it on their radar. In 2024 and in the first quarter of 2025, more than a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil trade and around one fifth of global oil and petroleum product consumption passed through it; for LNG, the share was also around one fifth. In March 2026, the disruptions temporarily pushed oil prices to almost 120 US dollars per barrel, while shipping costs also rose sharply, as rerouting leads to higher costs and longer delivery times.
For the plastics and packaging industry in Germany, this means that the pressure is coming not only from energy, but also from feedstocks, logistics, insurance and general uncertainty in procurement. Even if Europe is not the main buyer via Hormuz — in 2025, almost 90 percent of the volumes exported there went to Asia and just over 10 percent to Europe — the continent is still fully affected through global market prices, LNG competition and freight costs.
What should have happened earlier to make companies more independent from volatile virgin material prices, import pressure and geopolitical crises when it comes to packaging materials — and what role do recyclates play in this?
For far too long, we treated recyclates as a pure price issue: is virgin material currently cheaper, or recyclate? That was too short-sighted. The debate should really have been framed as a question of industrial resilience — in other words, as a combination of raw material security, industrial policy, climate protection and security of supply.
Because crises always show the same pattern: when global supply chains come under pressure, it is not the cheapest materials on the spot market that count, but secured availability, regional material flows and reliable reprocessing capacities. This is exactly what the current debate in Europe is pointing to: the recycling industry is suffering from high energy costs, unpredictable virgin material prices and the pressure of cheap imports.
We would have been better prepared if we had expanded recycling capacities systematically at an earlier stage, embedded recyclates more firmly in procurement and packaging design, relied on long-term purchase agreements instead of opportunism, and understood the circular economy not as a CSR issue but as a raw materials strategy. Then we would be reacting far less nervously today to every geopolitical fluctuation.
How can it be prevented that recyclates lose competitiveness again during phases of low virgin material prices? Does this require stronger political guardrails or above all greater market discipline?
It requires both — but without political guardrails, market discipline alone will not be enough.
The underlying problem is well known: when virgin material becomes temporarily cheap due to oil price cycles, overcapacities or imports, recyclates immediately come under pressure. That is exactly what is already weighing on the market today; the European recycling industry is struggling with low and difficult-to-plan virgin material prices as well as cheap imports.
The European Commission has therefore already announced measures to strengthen the plastics circular economy.
From my point of view, four things are needed: binding minimum recycled content quotas where they make technical sense, clear quality and verification standards so that fair competition is possible at all, long-term purchasing and offtake models on the corporate side, and less opportunistic switching between virgin material and recyclate with every price signal.
Put differently: policymakers must set the framework, but companies must stop only wanting recyclate when it happens to be the cheapest material of the month.
In your view, is the current price shock really a wake-up call?
Yes, I see the current situation as an opportunity for a genuine wake-up call — depending on whether we are finally willing to understand. Not because we are suddenly confronted with something entirely new, but because it is now becoming very clear that the geopolitical balance of power has changed.
Germany and Europe are operating in a world in which politics can no longer guarantee permanently low-cost and at the same time reliably available resources. It can set a framework, it can promote diversification, but it cannot regulate away the vulnerability of global raw material markets.
What would show you in three to five years that the industry has learned the right lessons from this?
Recyclates remain in use even when virgin material temporarily becomes cheaper.
Companies conclude long-term offtake agreements instead of switching back with every price impulse.
There are more regional recycling and reprocessing capacities in Europe.
Packaging is designed more consistently so that it is genuinely fit for circularity.
And transparent, traceable supply chains become a real purchasing and quality criterion — not just a compliance appendix.
So the real test is still to come: not in what the industry says now during the crisis, but in whether it buys differently, designs differently and invests differently afterwards.
Thank you very much for the interview, Ms Schweig.
Author: Alexander Stark, Editor FACHPACK360°
