Industry partners launch national recycling initiative
A new, Government-backed national plastics recycling campaign has been launched that aims to increase the collection of plastic packaging for recycling.
The cross-industry partnership, ‘Pledge 4 Plastics’ is led by Recoup and supported by partners including, Coca Cola Enterprises, Marks & Spencer, Unilever, PlasticsEurope, WRAP and Defra, and has been formed to tackle the serious issue of plastic packaging recycling in the UK and help to meet the challenging targets set by the UK Government.
With all UK local authorities providing service provision for recycling of plastic bottles, the Pledge 4 Plastics campaign is urging people to make a promise to recycle just one extra plastic bottle, per household, each week using their existing services. With the current household plastic bottle-recycling rate of only 58 percent, there is vast potential for increased collections. By diverting more material to recycling, this campaign will deliver economic and environmental benefits for waste management companies, local authorities and reprocessors.
“The Pledge 4 Plastics campaign aims to encourage people to think and act differently and rewards them for doing so,” explained Stuart Foster, CEO of Recoup. “We want to highlight how great things can come from recycling unwanted plastic.”
Recoup says irrespective of collection service provision, this campaign recognises the opportunity to improve the consistency of message which will be key to reduce the confusion that consumers face[1]. Pledge 4 Plastics is designed to encourage consumers to recycle all plastic bottles, from water and drinks bottles to shampoo bottles, domestic bleach and cooking oil bottles.
The campaign has full government support. Resources Management Minister Dan Rogerson said: “The UK has made tremendous progress on recycling over the last 10 years, building a stronger circular economy and greener society, and this reflects a lot of hard work from industry and local authorities, alongside a desire from residents to do more. This is another great initiative to boost the recycling of plastic packaging which has our full and ongoing support – I’ve already made my pledge and encourage others to sign-up to do their bit.”
To highlight the many ways plastic can be given a new life if recycled correctly, interior designer, Abigail Ahern, has created her first ever bespoke phone cover, which is made from 80 percent recycled plastic bottles. One thousand limited edition phone covers have been designed exclusively for Pledge 4 Plastics, to reward those who register their support online throughout September at pledge4plastics.co.uk, tweet @pledge4plastics, or like the Facebook page (pledge4plastics) and share the posts.
A comprehensive toolkit has been developed to provide a wide range of resources that can be used by all organisations with the aim to ensure consistency in any UK communications about plastic packaging recycling. The toolkit can be downloaded from http://www.pledge4plastics.co.uk/toolkit-download.
[1] Pledge 4 Plastics consumer insight work, Understanding Barriers to Plastic Recycling – A Consumer Insight Study, March 2014