Vanden director responds to UK Plastics Pact agreement

Vanden Recycling, a plastic reclamation specialist based in the East of England, has welcomed the Plastics Pact of major packaging contributors announced last week in the UK, but warned the system requires better labelling of packaging to ensure it can be properly recycled.

David Wilson, Vanden Recycling UK’s Managing Director, said: "It's great to see big brands getting on board with the UK Plastics Pact, working collaboratively and setting clear targets including an average of 30 per cent recycled content in their packaging - this will help to stimulate and promote the market for recycled plastic content, and provides a commitment to ensure more investment can be made in UK recycling infrastructure.

“It is encouraging that a target has been set for 70 per cent of plastic packaging to be recycled or composted, although we would advocate that compostable plastic packaging should be avoided to prevent contamination of the plastic recycling stream.

“But to meet this 70 per cent target, we will need better labelling of what can and can't be recycled. It could be a simple ‘yes it can be recycled' or ‘no it can't be recycled' with ‘yes' meaning that it can be recycled and collected by all local authorities for recycling. This will help to end confusion.

“It should also stimulate product designers to take more care and think more about the design process to make recycling at the end of a product's life easier. We hope that they will start to reduce the type of packaging that is difficult to recycle.”