Draft letter from DEF and Dacorum Borough Council to food retailer
Dear ,
Packaging Waste – a challenge for our Borough
This is a joint letter from Dacorum Borough Council and the Dacorum Environmental Forum, an independent voluntary group comprising representatives from around ninety environmental and community organisations in Dacorum, which was set up by the Council in 1993 as part of the UK Government's Strategy for Sustainable Development.
It is an invitation to you as the local representative of (Company name) to help protect both the global and the local environment by reducing the amount of packaging waste, and non-recyclable waste in particular that is currently either collected within the Borough or spread around it as litter.
Packaging waste contributes disproportionately to the litter problems that we all experience daily, and that represent an uncaring attitude to the value of wasted raw materials by all involved in manufacturing and retailing as well as by careless consumers. The cost of litter clearance is borne largely and unfairly by the Borough Council, and ultimately by its taxpayers , together with some volunteer resource.
The Government’s DEFRA Waste Strategy for England 2007 set out the global environmental concerns as follows:
“As a society, we are consuming natural resources at an unsustainable rate. If every country consumed natural resources at the rate the UK does, we would need three planets to live on. The most crucial threat is from dangerous climate change. Our goal is to make the transition towards “One Planet Living”
Reducing waste is an important contributor to this goal. Each year, we generate about 100 million tonnes of waste from households, commerce and industry. Most of this ends up in landfill, where the biodegradable part generates methane (a potent greenhouse gas) while valuable energy is used in extracting and processing new raw materials.
Our aim must be to reduce waste by making products with fewer natural resources. We must break the link between economic growth and waste growth. Most products should be re-used or their materials recycled. Energy should be recovered from other wastes where possible.”
The report proposes a vision of shared responsibility between:
- Producers (to use more recycled materials and to design less wasteful products)
- Retailers (to reduce packaging and to source and market products that are less wasteful)
- Consumers (to generate less waste and separate products for recycling)
- Local Authorities (to provide recycling facilities for their residents) and
- The Waste Management Industry (to invest in facilities to recycle and recover waste).
One of the two sectors identified in the Waste Strategy as a priority for further action was the food and retail sector. The Government intends to amend producer responsibility regulations in order to minimise packaging, including setting optimal packaging standards for a product class. A number of retailers have signed up to the ‘Courtald Commitment’ to reduce household food and packaging waste, informing customers about packaging on their labels (e.g. whether or not materials can be recycled or composted, or whether they are biodegradable).
The Report “War on Waste” October 2007 Prepared for the Local Government Association focused on waste from the food and retail sector and, in particular, food packaging. The report compared the quantities of packaging (recyclable and non-recyclable) when purchasing a range of common food items representing a regular shopping basket from eight retailers (six supermarkets - ASDA, Lidl, Marks and Spencer, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Tesco - a local high street and a large market).
In this context we are writing to you and to other local managers of food retailers to invite you to respond with your policies and plans regarding product packaging in the context of your Company’s policies on Corporate and Social responsibility. If you could field one of your company’s packaging specialists to come and address one of the Forum's meetings - with relevant Councillors in attendance - they would be particularly welcome.
We attach a comparison table derived from the “War on Waste” report, and a list of some of the topics that Forum members and Councillors have raised.
We look forward to your response which should be addressed to:
| Local shops | Market | Asda | Lidl | M & S | Morrisons | Sainsbury | Tesco | Total/Average | |
| Total weight of basket (food and packaging) (grams) | 16,110 | 13,689 | 15,592 | 15,258 | 14,700 | 15,511 | 14,242 | 14,876 | 119,977 |
| Total weight of packaging (grams) | 769 | 710.5 | 714 | 799.5 | 782 | 779 | 749 | 684.5 | 5,988 |
| Packaging as proportion of total basket | 4.77% | 5.19% | 4.58% | 5.24% | 5.32% | 5.02% | 5.26% | 4.60% | 4.99% |
| Total weight of recyclable packaging (grams) | 611 | 563.5 | 503 | 489 | 469 | 530 | 525 | 422.5 | 4,113 |
| Proportion of total packaging that is recyclable | 79.45% | 79.31% | 70.45% | 61.16% | 59.97% | 68.04% | 70.09% | 61.72% | 68.69% |
| Total weight of non-recyclable packaging (grams) | 158 | 147 | 211 | 310.5 | 313 | 249 | 224 | 262 | 1,875 |
| Proportion of total packaging that is non-recyclable | 20.55% | 20.69% | 29.55% | 38.84% | 40.03% | 31.96% | 29.91% | 38.28% | 31.31% |
Yours sincerely,
for Dacorum Environmental Forum for Dacorum Borough Council
Phil Pennington Cllr Bert Chapman
Chairman Portfolio Holder for Environment
Gruff Edwards Cllr Alan Anderson
Vice-Chairman Chairman – Environment Overview and Scrutiny Committee
Cllr Neil Harden
Vice-Chairman – Environment Overview and Scrutiny Committee
Topics raised by Forum and Council members
- Preference for recyclable material in packaging, especially plastics.
- Avoidance of mixed-material packaging such as Tetra Pak.
- Use of in-store dispensers, for use with customer-provided container.
- Returnable glass containers.
- Preference for clear rather than coloured glass.
- Promotion of re-usable shopping bags.
- In-store identification and promotion of environmentally irresponsible packaging.
- Extension of the range of materials for which collection facilities are provided in store and/or car parks.
- Specific, locally based recycling information on packaging.
- Litter issues such as no-deposit trolleys over which the stores have direct control.
- Financial incentives for return of packaging.
- More use of biodegradable plastics
The following is a Retailer Summary Comparison Table (Derived by DEF from the LGA “War on Waste” October 2007 study)
| Local shops | Market | Asda | Lidl | M & S | Morrisons | Sainsbury | Tesco | Total/Average | |
| Total weight of basket (food and packaging) (grams) | 16,110 | 13,689 | 15,592 | 15,258 | 14,700 | 15,511 | 14,242 | 14,876 | 119,977 |
| Total weight of packaging (grams) | 769 | 710.5 | 714 | 799.5 | 782 | 779 | 749 | 684.5 | 5,988 |
| Packaging as proportion of total basket | 4.77% | 5.19% | 4.58% | 5.24% | 5.32% | 5.02% | 5.26% | 4.60% | 4.99% |
| Total weight of recyclable packaging (grams) | 611 | 563.5 | 503 | 489 | 469 | 530 | 525 | 422.5 | 4,113 |
| Proportion of total packaging that is recyclable | 79.45% | 79.31% | 70.45% | 61.16% | 59.97% | 68.04% | 70.09% | 61.72% | 68.69% |
| Total weight of non-recyclable packaging (grams) | 158 | 147 | 211 | 310.5 | 313 | 249 | 224 | 262 | 1,875 |
| Proportion of total packaging that is non-recyclable | 20.55% | 20.69% | 29.55% | 38.84% | 40.03% | 31.96% | 29.91% | 38.28% | 31.31% |