The New Flexible Plastics Recycling Program
Up until now it's been possible to recycle stretchy plastic bags at your local supermarket. Items such as bread bags, some vegetable bags, the bags from inside your cereal boxes and wraps from magazines were all possible to deposit in the provided bins along with any carrier bags. But so much plastic packaging isn't made of this stretchy plastic
WHAT'S CHANGED?
You can now recycle so much more thanks to a collaboration between the major producers & users of flexible plastics:
- Mondelēz International
- Unilever
- Mars UK
- Nestlé
- PepsiCo
The above businesses have set up a £1 million fund to help make flexible plastic recycling economically viable for recyclers and easier for consumers in the UK.
"The Flexible Plastic Fund is a first in the UK industry and is being led by producer compliance scheme, Ecosurety, with support from the environmental charity, Hubbub.
The Fund will collaborate with manufacturers, retailers and recyclers to improve flexible plastic recycling and reduce plastic pollution by giving the material a stable value.
This will, in turn, increase the supply of recycled plastic, enabling the industry to become more 'circular' and meet the forthcoming UK plastic packaging tax obligations.
WHAT FLEXIBLE PLASTICS CAN I RECYCLE?
This new scheme allows you to recycle all plastic films such as plastic snack wrappers, yogurt lids, pouch style packaging, films off fruit punnets, crisp wrappers, pouches and even cling film! It does all need to be clean and dry though and this is really important to ensure that they can be recycled.
Nom Nom Kids reusable pouches, snack bags, sandwich bags and ice pop bags can also be recycled via this scheme once they've reached the end of their lives.
WHERE CAN I RECYCLE MY FLEXIBLE PLASTICS?
The locations for dropping off flexible plastics is growing daily with locations at Sainsburys and Waitrose although Tesco's and some Co-op stores are reportedly also collecting but this could be for a similar scheme.
Check HERE for your local drop off point.
WHAT ELSE CAN WE DO REDUCE OUR WASTE
These schemes shouldn't be seen as a saviour to the current plastic crisis. It's fantastic that so much more can be recycled but WE ALL need to reduce the amounts of plastics that we are using in our daily life otherwise there will just be way too much waste to actually recycle all of it.
We also need to keep pressure on to ensure that businesses are reducing their packaging waste.
SIMPLE STEPS TO REDUCE YOUR PLASTIC USE:
- Buy loose when possible.
- Use reusable products over single use as much as you possibly can.
- Avoid multipacks with outer and inner packaging. Just buy 1 large pack and then decant into reusable bags/jars/boxes. Think crips, snacks and yogurts.
- Replace cling film or single use bags with silicone bowl covers, beeswax wraps or reusable bags and containers.
- Bake a homemade snack once a week.
- Cook from scratch when you can.
Let me know some more ideas in the comments and I'll add them in!!
Suzanne
Nom Nom Kids Reusable Pouches