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The European Vending Association (EVA) has been selected to hold a stand at the Green Week, to be held June 12 to 15 in Brussels, Belgium. This event, held under the heading “Only one Earth,” will examine the sustainable use of natural resources, focusing on waste management, sustainable consumption and production. Up to 4,000 participants are expected to visit the event.

Catherine Piana, EVA director general, said in a prepared statement: "This is a great opportunity to tell the good story of vending and to show the EU institutions, other industries, the press and the general public that the vending industry is a proactive and positive industry in this area, as well as in others."

The EVA has created a permanent, special page on the environment on its website (www.vending-europe.eu), which brings together all its members’ initiatives in this area.

The EVA is happy to use this opportunity to inform the EU Institutions, other industries, the press and the general public, about vending and the positive initiatives that its members have taken and will continue to take in order to protect the environment whilst running competitive businesses. The EVA groups together over 10,000 companies with extremely varied geographical scope and nature of activities: machine manufacturers, food and drink manufacturers, payment systems manufacturers, cup manufacturers, as well as operators, who run, fill maintain and service the machines.

In all these various sectors, however, there is growing awareness, not only of the need to protect the environment, but of the possibility to do this in a way that will not cost, but rather save, money to the businesses.

Here are some of the measures adopted by the EVA members:

• Full compliance with the WVEEE and RoHS Directives;
• Adoption of an EVA protocol to measure the energy consumption of vending machines (EVA-EMP EVA-Energy Measurement Protocol);
• Recycling schemes for cups or prods;
• Increasing number of companies ISO 14001 certified or taking measures to become more environmentally-friendly;
• Investing in R&D in the areas of eco-efficiency and refrigeration;
• Paper cups or biodegradable cups as alternatives to traditional plastic cups;
• Enhancing the value of plastic cups at the end of their lifecycle;
• PET used for the packaging of soft drinks and bottled water
• Better packaging of machines to limit packaging material; use of smaller or recyclable pallets;
• LED lights are being introduced in new machines;
• Vending machines placed outdoors are now made with special glass with an isolating structure, to limit the energy and heat generated by the sun.

  All these initiatives, and more, will be displayed on the EVA Stand at the Green Week. For more information, please visit:

  http://vending-europe.eu/en/commitees/environment/green-week.html.