Date of ratification: 2014/02/20

Article 1: In order to implement Article 50 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran and to protect the country’s environment from the harmful effects of waste and its optimal management, all ministries, organizations, government institutions, and non-governmental public institutions whose inclusion in the law requires mentioning their names, and all companies, institutions, and natural and legal persons, are obliged to comply with the regulations and policies stipulated in this law.

Article 2: The terms and expressions used in this law have the following meanings:

A) Organization: Environmental Protection Organization

B) Waste: refers to solid, liquid, and gaseous materials (other than sewage) that are directly or indirectly the result of human activity and are considered waste from the perspective of the producer. Waste is divided into five groups:

1. Normal waste: It refers to all waste that is normally produced from daily human activities in cities, villages and outside them, such as household waste and construction waste.

2. Medical (hospital) waste: It refers to all infectious and harmful residues from hospitals, health centers, medical diagnostic laboratories and other similar centers. Other hazardous hospital waste is excluded from this definition.

3. Special waste: It refers to all waste that requires special care due to the high level of at least one of the hazardous properties, such as toxicity, pathogenicity, explosiveness or flammability, corrosion and the like. Those types of medical waste, as well as some of the normal, industrial and agricultural waste that require special management, are considered special waste.

4. Agricultural waste: It refers to waste resulting from production activities in the agricultural sector, such as waste, animal carcasses (livestock, poultry and aquatic animals), rotten or unusable agricultural products.

5. Industrial waste: It refers to all waste resulting from industrial and mining activities and refinery wastes of the gas, oil and petrochemical industries and power plants and the like, such as shavings, overflows and industrial sludge.

C) Waste executive management: A natural or legal person who is responsible for planning, organizing, monitoring and executive operations related to the production, collection, storage, separation, transportation, recycling, processing and disposal of waste, as well as training and information in this field.

1. Disposal: All methods of eliminating or reducing the risks arising from waste, such as recycling, sanitary landfill, waste incineration
2. Processing: All mechanical, chemical and biological processes that facilitate disposal operations.

D) Pollution means the same definition as that provided in Article (9) of the Environmental Protection and Improvement Law – approved on June 18, 1974