Reducing Plastic Pollution through the Extended Producer Responsibility

UNEP and NREF launched their partnership on reducing plastic pollution through the Extended Producer Responsibility

PARIS, 10 May 2022 – Today, the United Nations Environment Programme and the Norwegian Retailers' Environment Fund launched the Enhancing Global and National Capacity to Implement Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) – a new project that aims to strengthen global and national capacity to develop, implement and mainstream the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) approaches to reduce plastic pollution.

The UNEP-Facilitated online event, which hosted more than a hundred participants and led by expert moderators and panellists, discussed the design and implementation of EPR, which has been widely recognised as a critical instrument in increasing the collection and recycling rate of waste, to encourage more sustainable product design, and promoting circularity on a global and national level.

“We need everyone on board and cooperating to reduce plastic pollution, and we share this vision with the Norwegian Retailers’ Environment Fund,” said Elisa Tonda, Head of Consumption and Production Unit at UNEP. “The support from the Fund will enable us to learn from the perspectives and experience of the industry, while providing value platform and resources for us to enhance the cooperation with the private sector, through concrete technical work, capacity development, and open dialogues” She added.

"The Norwegian Retailers' Environment Fund's main focus is making significant and lasting environmental impact with our funding we provide, both nationally and internationally. In a global context, we believe that the structural changes and effective implementation of EPR contribute to exactly that. We are happy to be partnering up with UNEP and contributing to their important work connected to EPR,” stated Erik Oland, acting CEO at NREF.

The first panel discussion, led by Joachim Qu oden, Managing Director at EXPRA, discussed the opportunities, barriers and lessons learnt in EPR development and enforcement with the support of expert panelists from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment in South Africa, the Government of Chile, and Nigeria Food & Beverage Recycling Alliance.

The panel discussed the success factors for EPR, including creating a legislative environment for EPR implementation that enables strong collaboration with a wide range of stakeholders. All key stakeholders, including the national and local governments, municipalities, the industry and Producer Responsibility Organizations, consumers, waste collectors and recyclers (including the informal sector), and researchers should take part in the EPR implementation, learn to collaborate with one another and develop clear and inclusive guidelines that facilitate the operation of EPR.

The discussion was followed by another moderated panel led by Professor Rosalind Malcolm from the University of Surrey that focused on EPR development and enforcement through actions from international partners. Panelists involved key experts from Danone, Ellen MacArthur Foundation, Consumer Goods Forum, and PREVENT Waste Alliance.

The second panel highlighted the importance of not looking at the EPR as a one-size-fits-all solution but rather as a part of the solution, particularly needing adaption in local contexts. This partnership will help encourage and inspire parties interested in EPR through a regular sharing of challenges, successes and lessons learned, especially on ways to interact with the formal and informal sectors, managing information and digitalisation, and upscaling the approach in different contexts. In addition, EPR should go beyond downstream while advancing innovation and upstream solutions for waste reduction and minimisation from the source.

This launch will be followed by a series of delivery of the project, including:

• Implementation guidelines for the government to develop, improve and monitor EPR policies
• Operational manuals and toolkits for the operation of Producer Responsibility Organisation (PRO) 
• A compilation of case studies from forerunning countries and PROs
• A technical helpdesk to provide real-time support to governments and PROs in at least eight countries
• Knowledge sharing and training

UNEP is enthusiastically looking forward to collaborating with partners to build on existing knowledge and work while increasing the scale and impacts of EPR implementation at global, regional, national and sub-national levels. 

Recording

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Notes to Editors

About the Project

This collaboration aims to develop global EPR guidelines, operational manuals and supporting toolkits to harmonise EPR policy under the project entitled: Enhancing National and Local Capacity to Implement Extended Producer Responsibility to Reduce Plastic Pollution and Improve Resource Efficiency. The project will develop global EPR guidelines, operational manuals, and supporting toolkits for governments and businesses. The global guidelines-founded project will provide tailored technical support to two pilot countries to test and improve their global EPR guidelines. Based on these two activities. Additionally, the project will also organise capacity building and dissemination events for more countries (at least 6) through an EPR helpdesk to increase their capacity.

About the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)

UNEP is the leading global voice on the environment. It provides leadership and encourages partnership in caring for the environment by inspiring, informing and enabling nations and peoples to improve their quality of life without compromising future generations.

About the Norwegian Retailers' Environment Fund (NREF)

The NREF is Norway's largest private environmental fund and supports national and international projects that reduce plastic pollution, increase plastic recycling and reduce the consumption of plastic bags. The Fund is Norway's most important measure to comply with the EU Plastic Bags Directive.

For more information, please contact:

• Feng Wang, Programme Officer, UN Environment Programme
• Ran Xie, Associate Programme Officer, UN Environment Programme
• Mari Kristin Martinsen, Adviser environment & society, NREF