Turn off the plastic tap or eternally mop up the mess?: Approaching plastic packaging product stewardship in NZ

Hannah Blumhardt

Senior Associate at the Institute for Governance & Policy Studies, Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington

Coordinator, New Zealand Product Stewardship Council

11 December 2022, Aotearoa Plastic Pollution Alliance Annual Hui 2022

So, what are we talking about?

• August 2019: Public consultation on idea of declaring plastic packaging a “priority product” under the WMA.
• July 2020: Plastic packaging declared a “priority product”. Scheme must be designed and accredited by July 2023.
• September 2022: Govt announces The Packaging Forum and the Food and Grocery Council to design the plastic packaging product stewardship scheme.

Key points

• Industry-led scheme design creates inherent conflict of interest that marginalises public good outcomes, and risks an under-ambitious scheme that fails to properly address the causes of plastic pollution, or fully internalise its costs.
• In practice, we are already seeing the Government and the two industry groups prematurely limiting the final scheme scope, by anticipating a focus on collection, rather than a broader agenda that follows the waste hierarchy.
• This is at odds with the Govt’s vision of a circular economy for Aotearoa, the growing science about the nature, causes and effects of plastic pollution, and international trends regarding product policy, packaging regulation, and the global plastics treaty negotiation.
• A scheme that includes measures proportionate to the plastic pollution crisis would strive for outcomes across the waste hierarchy – achieving this probably requires independent oversight of scheme design.

Zooming out:

The bigger picture context

Getting real

• Pollution from plastic production, use, and waste is severely impacting humans, ecosystems, wildlife, terrestrial, freshwater, coastal and marine environments.
• Across human society, plastic’s negative impacts are felt unevenly and reflect inequities & injustices.
• Without big change in policy direction, negative impacts will increase dramatically over the coming decades.

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- OECD (2022) Global Plastics Outlook: Economic Drivers, Environmental Impacts and Policy Options

Sleepwalking into unchartered territory...

“... the safe operating space of the planetary boundary of novel entities is exceeded since annual production and releases are increasing at a pace that outstrips the global capacity for assessment and monitoring... We recommend taking urgent action to reduce the harm associated with exceeding the boundary by reducing the production and releases of novel entities, noting that even so, the persistence of many novel entities and/or their associated effects will continue to pose a threat.” ��– Linn Persson et al (2022) “Outside the Safe Operating Space of the Planetary Boundary for Novel Entities” Environ Sci Technol 56(3). https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.1c04158.

Image as tweeted by Kate Raworth, 19 Jan 2020: “This is big and bleak news. The planetary boundary for chemical pollution (aka 'novel entities') has been quantified for the first time - and it's now clear that humanity is massively transgressing levels that are safe for life on Earth. Plastics!”

We must reduce the amount of plastic coming into the global economy

“Ensuring the safety of every available plastic and chemical is impossible, as their rates of appearance in the environment exceed governments’ capacities to assess associated risks and control problems... Even when applying all political and technological solutions available today, including substitution, improved recycling, waste management, and circularity, annual plastic emissions to the environment can only be cut by 79% over 20 years; after 2040, 17.3 million tons of plastic waste will still be released to terrestrial and aquatic environments every year (11). To fully prevent plastic pollution, the path forward must include a phaseout of virgin plastic production by 2040.” ��- Bergmann et al (2022) “A global plastic treaty must cap production” Science 376 (6592). DOI: 10.1126/science.abq0082.

Basically:

“Turn Off the Plastic Tap” art collaboration by Benjamin Von Wong and 100 residents of Kibera region of Nairobi

Regulating plastic packaging is critical to this bigger picture goal

• Plastic packaging is the single biggest market for plastic, globally (at 31%), and makes up 40% of all plastic waste generation (OECD (2022)).
• In New Zealand, roughly 60% of all imported plastic resin is used to make packaging.

“The need for alternatives to single-use packaging is clear.”

– United Nations Environment Programme (2022) Single-use supermarket food packaging and its alternatives: Recommendations from life cycle Assessments Nairobi

What does this all mean?

• We can’t turn off the plastic tap without completely changing society’s approach to packaging.

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B)We can’t go around regulating plastic packaging without acknowledging this bigger picture...

Zooming back in again:

July 2020: Plastic packaging declared a “priority product” – finally earmarked for regulation

Scope of priority product declaration

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6. Plastic Packaging

All packaging used for consumer goods at retail or wholesale level (excluding beverage containers) made of plastic resin codes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7, singly or in combination with one or more of these plastics or any non-plastic material, and not refilled by the producer for retail sale or able to be refilled by the consumer at a retail establishment.

A product stewardship scheme for any packaging that fits this definition must be designed and accredited – YAY! But what is product stewardship?

What is product stewardship?

This is pretty broad and leaves space for ambitious schemes that cover full product lifecycles – yay!

MfE summary of product stewardship

Oh, where has this definition come from?

Concepts drawn from General Guidelines

Furthermore... who’s setting the rules?

2022: Plastic packaging product stewardship scheme design gets underway

• Industry-led, but 75% Government (public) funded
• Stipulated outcomes:
• “We are also utilising funding from the Waste Minimisation Fund to help design a regulated plastic packaging product stewardship scheme for New Zealand. Once in place it will require producers, brand owners, importers, retailers and consumers to take responsibility for collecting and dealing with plastic packaging.” (Hon David Parker)
• “Ultimately, the project will look at how plastic is currently collected – or not – and whether there is a more efficient and effective way to do this.” (Tony Nowell, Independent Chair)
• “As industry, we have a responsibility to deal with the end-of-life recovery for packaging.” (Rob Langford, The Packaging Forum, CE)

In public comms so far, no mention of plastic pollution or clean-up (legacy or future), no mention of activity higher up the waste hierarchy nor reduction in production or consumption.

Is an industry-designed scheme to increase efficiency & efficacy of collecting EOL plastic packaging likely to turn off the plastic tap? Asking for a friend.

Full lifespan of plastic suggests there’s more going on than simply collecting EOL plastic...

International trends

Increased recognition globally that EPR/PS must incorporate activities up the waste hierarchy & cover full lifecycle

United Nations Environment Programme “Priorities, needs, challenges and barriers relating to ending plastic pollution at the national level” UNEP/PP/INC.1/11, 15 September 2022:

• Member state submissions identified: “Lack of links between extended producer responsibility and other end-of-life-oriented policies and upstream and midstream goals”

EU Commission proposals on Packaging & Packaging Waste Directive

Three main objectives:

1. Prevent generation of packaging waste: reduce it in quantity, restrict unnecessary packaging and promote reusable and refillable packaging solutions.
2. Boost high quality (‘closed loop') recycling: make all packaging on the EU market recyclable in an economically viable way by 2030.
3. Reduce the need for primary natural resources and create a well-functioning market for secondary raw materials, increasing the use of recycled plastics in packaging through mandatory targets.

Global Plastics Treaty

• Broad mandate:
• A comprehensive approach that addresses the full life cycle of plastic
• Promote sustainable production and consumption of plastics through, among other things, product design and environmentally sound waste management, including through resource efficiency and circular economy approaches
• Promote national and international cooperative measures to reduce plastic pollution in the marine environment, including existing plastic pollution
• National action plans to work towards the prevention, reduction and elimination of plastic pollution, and to support regional and international cooperation
• Scientific and socioeconomic assessments related to plastic pollution
• Key issues to include in the negotiation process as emerging from 21 submissions of Member States, includes:
• Reducing the production of virgin plastics
• Sustainable product design
• Reducing and eliminating single-use, problematic, unnecessary, hazardous and harmful plastics through product design
• Removing hazardous chemicals used as additives in plastics.
• Innovating and developing more sustainable alternatives
• Reduction in consumption and sustainable consumption in the use phase

Three strategic goals

1. Restrain plastic consumption and production to sustainable levels
2. Enable a circular economy for plastics that protects the environment and human health
3. Achieve environmentally sound management and recycling of plastic waste

Seven key deliverables for success

1. Eliminate problematic plastics, including by bans and restrictions.
2. Develop global sustainability criteria and standards for plastics
3. Set global baselines and targets for sustainability throughout the lifecycle of plastics.
4. Ensure transparency in the value chain of plastics, including for material and chemical composition.
5. Establish mechanisms for strengthening commitments, targets and controls over time.
6. Implement monitoring and reporting at each stage through the lifecycle of plastics.
7. Facilitate effective technical and financial assistance, scientific and socio-economic assessments.

New Zealand has joined by the High Ambition Coalition!

What can we take from this?

• To be meaningful & effective, regulating plastics, including the top plastic user (packaging), needs to take into account the scientific consensus around urgency and scale of action.
• 21^st century global conversations about regulating plastic are not just looking at collection for recycling but also:
• Reducing production and consumption
• Making plastics safer by monitoring and phasing-out chemical additives of concern
• Incentivising/requiring sustainable alternatives, including reuse/refill systems
• Closing the loop on recycling
• Creating responsibility to prevent and mitigate plastic pollution and just financial mechanisms for this
• A push to inform conversations through independent science

The following measures should at least be on the table in NZ’s scheme design process...

• Redesign/Reduction/Reuse
• Binding consumption reduction targets for plastic packaging put on the market (by packaging unit, not just tonnage).
• A levy on virgin material usage.
• Mandatory disclosure of the additives used in plastic packaging and a mandatory phase-out of whole classes of chemicals of concern in plastic packaging.
• Support for a material agnostic levy on all non-reusable packaging.
• Support for material agnostic reuse targets for packaging.
• All packaging being designed for either reuse or recycling at least.
• Recovery/Recycling
• Binding collection rate targets of at least 90%.
• Minimum access requirements for resource recovery drop-offs for the packaging.
• Recycled content targets, provided this can be achieved without compromising human health.
• Cost internalisation for producers
• Producer fees that cover the full costs of recovery for/and of reuse/recycling, and that modulate based on product ease of reusability/recyclability
• Producer fees also cover the clean-up costs for plastic packaging that has escaped waste management systems.
• A proportion of producer fees redirected to reuse/refill infrastructure.
• Transparency and data
• Regular, mandatory transparent/public reporting from all companies using plastic packaging on the quantity of plastic packaging they introduce to the market (by unit and tonnage) to a relevant regulatory body.

Options for bringing greater robustness & ambition to plastic packaging scheme design

• Govt-led, independent Technical Advisory Group
• Greater public articulation of expectations that the final scheme will align with science & international trends.
• Update Guidelines and WMA to strengthen scheme design in longer-term

Thank you

Hannah Blumhardt

Senior Associate, Institute for Governance & Policy Studies, Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington

Coordinator, New Zealand Product Stewardship Council

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Hannah.Blumhardt@vuw.ac.nz