One resident of the Vilnius region threw an average of about 240 kilograms of waste into mixed waste containers last year, while in 2024 this number reached more than 252 kilograms, according to data from the Vilnius County Waste Management Center (VAATC).
“Overall, the trends are not bad, as the total flow of mixed waste is gradually decreasing, and this is mainly influenced by the growing awareness of residents in the field of sorting,” says Tadas Vasiliauskas, Head of Communications and Strategy at VAATC, in a statement.
As the total amount of mixed waste decreases, positive changes are also observed in individual categories. According to VAATC data, in the fall of 2025, the record-low average amount of food waste was recorded in mixed waste – 37,3 kilograms.
Also, last year, the best result was achieved in the area of packaging waste – in the autumn, 63 kilograms were found in the mixed waste stream, the lowest during the entire index monitoring period.
However, in the area of textile waste sorting, a less encouraging trend was recorded in the autumn of 2025 – a record amount of textile waste was recorded in mixed municipal waste for the entire index monitoring period – 31,2 kilograms.
“Around the world, and in Lithuania as well, the growth of textile waste is greatly influenced by the so-called “fast fashion”, when low-quality and difficult-to-recycle, low-priced textile products are offered to our market and find great demand. Although specialized textile containers have already been installed in public places and other sorting options have been created, a significant part of textiles still ends up in the mixed waste stream, thus losing the opportunity to recycle or reuse them,” says T. Vasiliauskas.
When evaluating the average of all quarters of the previous year, packaging accounted for 31,9 percent (76,5 kg) of mixed waste, food waste – 19,3 percent (46,3 kg), textiles – 8,1 percent (19,4 kg), and the remaining mixed waste – 40,7 percent (97,8 kg).
The “Sorting Index” in the metropolitan region has been calculated every quarter since 2019.
VAATC is the largest regional waste management company in Lithuania, serving more than 878 thousand residents of the Vilnius region.