^{Date:              18 September 2008
Embargo:       None}

Defra Waste Strategy Stakeholder Meeting

ESA attended the recent meeting of Defra’s Waste Stakeholder Group, which focused on the issue of sustainable products and materials. Defra revealed that they intend to focus on “high impact” products and services, with clothing and electronic equipment, two of the product streams already selected for closer focus.

In a presentation by Defra it was revealed that the department intends to focus on “high impact” products and services, with clothing and electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) two of the product streams already selected for closer focus. A “roadmap” approach has been adopted to investigate and mitigate product impacts across their lifecycle, allowing the most damaging points in the product lifecycle to be identified, understood and then mitigated. This approach drew broad support from stakeholders.

Defra reported on its work on the clothing roadmap, highlighting that the recycling rate for clothing appears only to be approximately 14% at present. A number of studies are being undertaken to investigate the nature of the sector, its impacts, and potential for environmental and social improvement.

Stakeholders agreed that additional data was required on waste clothing arisings and waste management routes, that it should be made easier for householders to recycle clothing, and that there should be a stronger message to householders that clothing should not be placed in the residual waste. There was widespread support for producer responsibility in order to ramp up the recycling rate, but acknowledgement that suitable additional handling and processing infrastructure would be required if significant diversion away from landfill was to take place. There was also uncertainty as to the availability of end markets for reprocessed low value waste clothing.

Discussion on EEE focused on the performance of the UK WEEE Regulations, in particular whether they could be regarded as a success. There was agreement that public awareness-raising of the WEEE collection system was needed to increase the tonnage of material flowing through the system, and while the introduction of Individual Producer Responsibility was seen as key to incentivising design for recycling, there was no consensus on how this might best be introduced on a practical level.

ESA has been monitoring the growing importance of the Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP) agenda, which is being addressed both by the United Nations Marrakech Process and by the OECD, as demonstrated by the joint OECD-UN Conference on Resource Efficiency held in April this year.

For its part, the UK Government appears to consider product policy an issue best dealt with at EU-level, requiring action on a single market basis rather than at the level of individual Member States. The degree to which the Government is prepared to champion action on the SCP agenda within the EU is currently unclear.

ENDS