Governments have a generational opportunity to address the global challenge of plastic waste next week, when they gather for the fifth and final time to negotiate a United Nations Global Treaty to End Plastic Pollution.
Establishing global rules to address this global challenge makes sense, not only for governments but business as well. They give certainty and clarity and help ensure that industry and governments work together to address issues that go beyond any one organization.
As a member of the Business Coalition for a Global Plastic Treaty, PepsiCo Inc. is advocating for an ambitious and effective treaty. Such a treaty could advance key system shifts across supply chains, business models, infrastructure and policy, and, in doing so, support the future of both sustainable packaging and the circular economy. It is crucial to find solutions together across stakeholder groups, and across geographies. That is what can be achieved through a legally binding global treaty.
One important piece of the puzzle is addressing the lack of globally harmonized policies on how plastics are designed, used and managed after use. PepsiCo has been part of industry-led initiatives to align on key guidelines, such as the Consumer Goods Forum Golden Design Rules, but such voluntary efforts cannot alone solve the global challenge. Globally harmonized policies will reduce limitations on how widely effective solutions can be scaled, and can provide clear direction, systems and opportunity for actors in the plastics value chain to help influence change.
Another important piece is well-designed extended producer responsibility (EPR) schemes, which have been effective mechanisms for improving local recycling rates throughout the world and addressing the full life cycle of plastics, from design to proper disposal. But without clear definitions and harmonized principles to guide their implementation, this solution is not scaled to the level it could be. Including such clarity and global principles for well-designed EPR schemes within a final treaty could help change that and accelerate the implementation of effective and efficient collection and recycling systems in more places around the world.
So, what is an EPR scheme? Essentially, it is a system that asks the companies who put packaging into the market to help pay for and manage the collection and recycling of that packaging, including plastics, through industry-run "producer responsibility organizations (PROs)." Well-designed EPR can also include support for consumer education on how and what to recycle. These investments in recycling infrastructure can all help lessen the burden on local governments and help ensure that recycling is a part of everyday life.
In Belgium, where a well-designed EPR has existed since 1993, managed by local PRO FostPlus, the impact has been clear.
PepsiCo has been one of the companies collaborating with FostPlus for many years, engaging with producers, consumers, waste managers and the government, to put in place an optimal ecosystem that collects, sorts and recycles household packaging. In 2023, FostPlus achieved an overall recycling rate of 97 percent in Belgium, including 68 percent of plastics packaging across a broad range of materials, including PET bottles and flexible films.
Well-designed EPR abides by common principles but at the same time is flexible enough to meet local needs. That's how it can evolve and be sustained for more than 30 years, like in Belgium, or be newly implemented in different parts of the world.
In South Africa, for example, multiple voluntary PROs and industry associations were asked to come together with government a few years ago to help finalize legislation for mandatory EPR in South Africa. Navigating their respective needs and focusing on the intricate details relevant to the local market, the group established the country's first mandatory EPR program that is still growing three years in.
Global principles to build such programs can facilitate the accelerated implementation of proven solutions at scale to tackle the global challenge of plastic waste. It's why establishing a global treaty can be so impactful.
Nations of the world are now at an inflection point. This is their opportunity to tackle the global challenge of plastic pollution head on, leveraging the momentum built through years of international negotiations to deliver an ambitious and binding treaty that paves the way for more meaningful action globally. It's important they seize this opportunity.
Anke Boykin is senior director, Global Environmental Policy at PepsiCo.