This week, our world is about to get a little less polluted. The Dutch government has effectuated regulation conceived last August in conjunction with the corporate world and the municipalities to collect and process the plastics in the garbage separately from the other waste.

No worries there, separated collection of garbage makes it easy to process it, as the separation is already done by the polluters. This saves money and energy, and thus the environment. Tis far the good news. The bad news is that separated collection actually takes a lot of money and effort, as the entire infrastructure to actually collect the stuff has to be put into place. Think in stuff such as bins, trucks, personnel, storage and processing plants. They all cost us dear money. But hey: in an effort to pollute less, why not?

The agreement can be summarized as follows: the corporate world pays packaging taxes, of which half is directed towards a fund (‘Afvalfonds’) to pay for the processing of the separatedly collected packaging garbage, and the other half is directed straight towards the government’s treasury. This should increase the amount of recycled garbage from 20% to 42%.
Nice, clean and simple regulation, with a clear focus.

Immediately after the announcement of this regulation, the supermarkets announced all products with packaging affected by these new rules would become more expensive (1% up), as they would have to pay a certain amount for every piece sold. This week, the price-increase kicked in and the CDA has woken up. Of all parties, the CDA (whose state-secretary Pieter van Geel actually signed the agreement) have complained about the increase in price as it negatively affects the consumers, us.
Somehow, CDA could be on to something: why does this taxation lead to an increase of exactly 1%, and not a fixed price of a few cents? Likely unintended, this question should be answered by research which is to be conducted by the NMA.

Furthermore, half of all paid taxation is headed directly for the treasury, yet it is not clear whether that money is destined for improving the environment (if possible at all). It seems to be used for lowering the social fees to be paid by employers, which is hardly an environmental-friendly destination. PvdD and SP: raise your voice! It is done right now by the VVD, the ones initiating the current destination of the money, which is also strange. Oh well, they must’ve forgot.

Eventually, the taxation of packaging would lead to less garbage to dispose of completely, and more recycling. Whether this will happen is the question, when the garbage is simply chucked to China to be processed, the environmental burden is simply relocated, and not lowered. It is cheaper though.
Finally, with an indicated lowered amount of garbage to be collected by the municipalities, the fees for collection would have to be lowered. When that happens, I will definitely blog about it!

Well, we probably all know the issues in Belgium these days.
After a period of 192 days, a new government has been formed under the supervision of Yves Leterme, which had to cope with a huge amount of concessions. The agreement was almost non-functional as both sides were dug in deep.

Today, and in the short week hereafter, this might all be work for nothing. A new dispute has been formed over the voting-district Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde (BHV). As it is partly french-speaking and partly Flemmish-speaking, the Flemmish want to divide the district into two new ones, with both languages having one district. This is much to the dismay of the French-speaking inhabitants of Belgium, and the are threatening to give up the parliament. The prime-minister wants to explore the matter for a few months, where his very own party wants to put the division to the vote.

What will happen is completely unpredictable. When the cabinet falls, new elections will probably be issued with an even more uncertain outcome. What do you think? Should we annexate the Dutch-speaking and make them into a new “provincie”? Or should we ignore them and their federal state and see it fall apart?

Yes, it does say murder. Our nation has been renowned for it’s mussels for ages, as ‘Zeeuwse Mosselen’ are world famous for their taste and fat.
Dutch mussels differ from all other mussels as they are treated well in every stage of their life, to benefit both the fishers and consumers and the mussels.

Nowadays, all production involving livestock has to be ‘durable’ (‘Duurzaam’) yet it has remained unclear for about half a century now what it means exactly. One can only guess it involves a humane life for the animals, no destructive impact on the (direct) environment and perhaps even fair pricespaid to the producers. All’s fair, yet the unclear definition has lead to environmentalist groups prosecuting all types of animal industry. The mussel is the newest in a row.

In my opinion, the production of mussels ís durable. For three or four generations, Dutch have fished for mussels in the Waddenzee, and all this time it has been good for both the fishermen (who made nice profits) and the mussels (the population is comparable in size, both total and per mussel, and location). The fishermen involved practice a type of gardening: small mussels are relocated to pieces of sea where they grow faster and to bigger sizes. These are then taken out of the water to be consumed whenever they are the appropriate size, but only after being placed in the Westerschelde for a relative short period of time to loose all the sand. After all, they are ‘Zeeuwse mosselen’.

Another example is the following: before the mussel-production was forcefully transferred from the Oosterschelde to the Waddenzee about 50 years ago, (the Oosterschelde was closed off from the North Sea due to the protection of our shore with the DeltaWerken) there were no Common Eiders on the Waddenzee. They now live and prosper there, diversification of an indigenous specie as a result of mussels.

The first week of March has been catastrophic for those involved in the production of mussels. The most influential advisory council in The Netherlands (Council of State) has withdrawn the semi-annual permit issued by the ministry of agriculture after lobbying by environmentalist groups. What’s ironic is that Vogelbescherming and the Waddenvereniging both also cheered after the withdrawal. No more production means less bird on the Waddenzee, what’s to cheer?

For 2008 and 2009, the production of mussels is available, yet limited. Starting in 2010, there will not be any Dutch mussels available. Possibly ever. The best mussels will be lost, and for what cause? That is still unclear, yet there is a connection to be found: dhr. W. van Dieren, who possibly made a deal with NAM to abolish the production of Cockles and Mussels in exchange for the drilling for oil in the Waddenzee. This is speculation, but the appearance of the member of ‘The Club of Rome’ is quite possibly not coincidental.

Inheritance tax probably is the most disliked and misunderstood form of taxation our country has. Whenever a departed dear one grants a part of their ‘fortune’ to you, you’ll have to pay taxes for receiving it, even when you have not yet received it (for instance, when your mom still lives in the parental house when your dad passed away).

Let’s face it: inheritance tax is obsolete and weird, as you’ll pay taxes over money that already has been taxed in the past, and possibly even re-taxed every year if the sum exceeded €20.000 (1.2% wealth tax).
State secretary of Finance de Jager has rightfully declared he intends to discard this kind of taxation, but he also mentioned that this would have to be done ‘budget neutrally’. in other words: the state cannot afford to loose the 2 billion euros of income generated from inheritance taxes each year. Therefore, De Jager needs to get that money from somewhere else. As this is not easily achievable, De Jager only makes the regulations surrounding inheritance easier. Not less.

Partners and children of the deceased, who now pay between 5% and 27% of the inherited sum, will be paying the same in the future, yet nephews, uncles, nieces and aunts will pay lower amounts. They now have to pay up to 68%, which is quite a lot. It also is a high percentage compared to our neighboring countries. (Dutch link)
Any cheers possibly appearing on the faces of those who think the law is put out of order will have to be fading away fast after reading this, as they quite possibly will not or very limitedly profit from the announced measures by De Jager.
However futile, the commitment of De Jager is to be applauded as it paves the way to more rigourous intervening when it comes to the inheritance taxes. Like in Sweden and Portugal, who declared inheritance taxation to be re-taxing owned money and completely abolished their laws accordingly.

I don’t think we are quite ready for such measurements, and the inheritance taxation will remain to be the most dreaded form of taxation in The Netherlands for quite some time to come.