1 Introduction

Robust, consistent data on how plastics are produced, used, and disposed of is a prerequisite for credible climate and circular-economy strategies. A legally binding UN plastics treaty will rely on countries’ ability to report data that are both credible and comparable across borders. As of today, however, the Nordic countries take different approaches to measuring plastic flows—limiting the potential for joint assessments and coordinated policy.

The Nordic countries have each developed their own plastic statistics strategies. These national inventories vary in both scope and assumptions: some cover broad flows, while others focus on specific product categories or waste streams (Fråne et al., 2022; Berge et al., 2023; Karppinen et al., 2025; Gravgård et al., 2021). The result is a set of fit-for-purpose national baselines—often rich in detail, but built on different scopes, definitions, and plastic fraction assumptions.

Sweden maintains a policy-oriented national baseline, recently updated with 2023 data to guide plastics policy (Fråne et al., 2022; Ljungkvist et al., 2025). Norway has published a preliminary statistical plastic account (Berge et al., 2023). Denmark integrates plastics into economy-wide physical supply and use tables (PSUTs), with a 2016 baseline and a detailed 2018 packaging account (Gravgård et al., 2021, 2023). Finland tracks roadmap indicators such as packaging recycling rates and litter data, but lacks a full plastic inventory (Karppinen et al., 2025). Iceland adopted a national plastics action plan in 2020 but still lacks a quantitative plastics inventory (Umhverfis- og auðlindaráðuneytið, 2020).

In response to these challenges, the Nordic Council of Ministers launched a regional initiative to systematically improve and harmonise plastic data across the Nordic countries. This report is a part of the second project under the initiative and builds on some of the challenges identified and high-level recommendations set out in the first project under the Nordic initiative, as outlined in the Nordic Council of Ministers’ 2024 summary report.

The summary report–A 2024 Nordic report, Better and Harmonised Statistics on Plastic Material Flows–concluded that this fragmentation prevents comparability and weakens the credibility of regional statistics. It highlighted two major challenges: varying assumptions about plastic content in goods or plastic streams, and the absence of a common methodology. The report recommended that countries build on international guidance, especially the UNITAR method and Plastic-KEYs initiative (Nordic Council of Ministers, 2024).

United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) is developing a model to support countries in building harmonised plastic-flow accounts using existing trade and production data. It responds to the growing need for comparable, policy-relevant statistics on plastic use and waste across national borders. The model aims to provide a structured approach for estimating plastic put-on-market and waste generation in a transparent, repeatable, and scalable manner across countries, thereby supporting a common international foundation for plastic inventories.

Our project consists of two phases:

Phase 1 focused on identifying the most relevant plastic data flows, assessing the availability and comparability of current data, and evaluating the cost–benefit of harmonising and increasing the availability of each data point.
Phase 2 included a Nordic expert workshop, a pilot test of the new UNITAR model for plastics Put-on-Market and plastic waste generated. It also looked at how plastic amounts can be estimated in relevant waste streams.
- Identify process challenges
- Test the draft version of the UNITAR model in practice to assess its potential and limitations as a tool for harmonising plastic inventories in the Nordics (analysed in Chapter 2 of this report)
- Examine how plastic shares are estimated in different waste categories (analysed in Chapter 3 of this report)
- Provide recommendations for further improvement of plastic statistics in a Nordic collaboration

Results from phase 1 and the Nordic expert workshop in phase 2 is available here.

1.1 Objective & scope

The objective of this pilot application is to provide a status overview of the pilot version of the UNITAR plastic model for estimating plastic put-on-market (POM) and plastic waste generation using data from the Nordic countries. The aim is to test the model’s applicability in practice—highlighting both its potential and its limitations—and to explore its possible use as a harmonised alternative or complement to national plastic inventories.

The pilot is characterised by the following design choices and limitations:

Model versions: The report used the pilot version of the UNITAR plastic model as of May 2025.
Available at: https://academy-ce.info/toolkits/
Geographic scope: Includes Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland (Iceland excluded due to data constraints).
Data: The trade and production data used are publicly available from Eurostat for European Union member states and from Statistics Norway (SSB) for Norwegian data.

In addition to testing the UNITAR model, the report examines how plastic shares can be estimated across relevant waste streams (Chapter 3).

1.2 Glossary

Table 1 An overview of key terms used in the report.

Term	Definition
Apparent Consumption	An indicator used to estimate how much of a material is used within a country. It is calculated as: Domestic production + Imports – Exports.
HS – Harmonised Commodity Description and Coding System	A globally standardised system for classifying traded goods, maintained by the World Customs Organization. It uses a 6-digit coding structure and is the foundation for many national and regional customs and trade classification systems.
CN – Combined Nomenclature	The Combined Nomenclature is the EU’s system for classifying traded goods. It builds on the international Harmonised System by adding two extra digits (for a total of 8), allowing for more detailed product categories within EU customs and trade statistics.
CPC – Central Product Classification	An international classification maintained by the United Nations Statistics Division. It groups products—both goods and services—based on their physical characteristics and intended use. CPC supports cross-country comparability in national accounts and statistics.
CPA – Statistical Classification of Products by Activity	A European product classification system that links products to the economic activities in which they are produced. It is used in production and structural business statistics, and forms the basis for classifications such as PRODCOM.
PRODCOM – Production Communautaire	A classification and data collection system managed by Eurostat that provides statistics on industrial production in the EU. It records the quantity and value of goods manufactured, linked to the CPA classification.
Material Flow Analysis (MFA)	A systematic, mass-balance-based method for quantifying material stocks and flows within a defined time and space boundary (Eurostat, 2018).
Primary plastic	Plastic polymerised for the first time from virgin fossil or bio-based feedstock.
Secondary plastic	Reprocessed from post-consumer or post-industrial plastic waste for use as a raw material.
Plastic-containing products	Products made from a combination of plastic and other materials. These may include items such as vehicles, electronics, textiles, or furniture. Because they are not wholly plastic, their plastic content must often be estimated separately.
Plastic shares / plastic content factors	Estimated proportions that indicate how much of a product’s weight is made up of plastic. These factors are used when the plastic content is not explicitly recorded and help convert gross product flows into plastic-specific estimates.
Put-on-market (POM)	The mass (or number of units) of plastic products supplied for the first time for distribution, consumption or use in a given market during a defined period (‘placing on the market’).
UNITAR – United Nations Institute for Training and Research	A United Nations body that provides training and technical assistance to countries on topics including sustainable development, environmental management, and statistical capacity-building.