Criteria for the quality of the effects of waste management targets in 2015-2017 in the countries of the European Union

For many years, the amount of waste generated on a global scale has shown an increasing tendency and their management and logistic is becoming a growing problem for most countries in the world. Waste management is an important issue to be addressed, as it concerns the three basic pillars of sustainable development: social, economic, and environmental. Therefore, it seems necessary to take initiatives to reduce the amount of waste generated and improve the waste management system. The article aims to analyse changes in the way of waste management and logistics in the European Union countries and the classification of these countries on the basis of the achieved effects in waste management. The article analyses three selected factors that reflect the effects of achieving environmental objectives in waste management. The cluster analysis method was used for the analysis. It found that EU countries differ in the quality of the results achieved in waste management, depending on the achievement of environmental management and sustainability objectives. In addition, the results of the analysis showed that the time factor has a significant impact on the classification of countries. High dynamics of the quality of effects in waste management were observed in the period under review.