Legal Considerations on Packaging Wastes

The basic principles for the extension of producer responsibility (EPR) have long been known. The government has no intention and it cannot change consumer behavior. As a result, they pushed the responsibility for reducing the environmental impact of packaging waste to packaging manufacturers.

Two recent proposals (one for the taxation initiative in San Francisco, USA, and the other for the European Union (EU) industry commitment letter on biodegradable polymers) have received widespread attention from the packaging and processing industry. The contents of the proposals themselves are more because they reflect two different policy measures to solve the packaging waste problem.

On January 26 last year, the San Francisco Environment Committee (COE) unanimously decided to submit the 007-04 resolution to the San Francisco Mayor and the San Francisco City Supervision Committee. According to the resolution, consumers in the San Francisco City will pay 17 cents for each paper or plastic bag when shopping at the store. Initially, this resolution was only applicable to large supermarkets with a total sales income of more than US$2 million, and will be gradually expanded to pharmacies, department stores, hardware stores, dry cleaners, newsagents and other consumer sites that use packaging bags.

In order to prove the rationality of the new taxation policy, Committee on the Environment No. 007-04 cited a set of more convincing data, including the number of trees felled for the production of paper bags, the amount of crude oil needed to produce plastic bags, and the streets of the city. White pollution on sewers and beaches, wild animals that are entangled or killed by plastic materials, etc. In addition, the resolution also mentions people's concerns that plastic bags are not easy to recycle compost and points out that plastic bags can damage recycling machines. The resolution also proposed that half of this tax will be transferred to San Francisco's environmental protection department for funding related projects and plans. The other half will be reserved for major supermarkets to fund the supply of "durable discount merchandise bags", "recycling in merchandise bags", "supply of compostable product bags" and "to provide free compostable bags for agricultural products and group shopping". A series of municipal approval projects.

The Environment Committee soon received a reply from the Mayor of San Francisco and the City Supervision Committee. They assigned San Francisco's environmental protection department to study the impact of shopping bags on the urban economy, and assessed the impact of shopping bag taxes on low-income families and multi-population households.

The research report of the environmental protection department was completed at the end of April and the results of the study may change the scope of the proposal.

From the operating procedures, the environmental protection department should first carry out assessment work, and then consider other environmental factors, and then take measures based on the assessment results to promote the recycling of goods bags and develop other action plans.

Contrary to the practice of the San Francisco City Council, the European Union recently considered and adopted a ten-year voluntary pledge for biodegradable bags and compostable polymer producers. The manufacturers stated in their letter of commitment that they must comply with EU Regulation EN13432 on “Recycling of compostable or biodegradable packaging” when producing and selling biodegradable, compostable bags. The signatories of the promises also promised that the polymers they provided could be biodegraded within 180 days, with a higher degradation rate than 90% cellulose, and a decomposition rate of more than 90% within 3 months.

Commitment The author of the bookmark has agreed to be supervised and certified by the DIN CERTCO and other EU certification bodies.

Once certified, these products are considered to meet the US and Japan standards for compostability certification. The certification bodies in these countries are working closely together to gradually harmonize their certification standards. This commitment agreement signed by European manufacturers does not clearly specify the goal of production and processing. It is in fact the extended application of the European Union standard EN13432.

The promised agreement accepts the participation of new signatories, especially those multinationals, provided that they must accept and abide by the terms and conditions of the agreement.

Target users of certified biodegradable polymers include the packaging industry (foodware, bags, woven mesh and foam, etc.), plastic shopping bag manufacturers and food waste collection bag manufacturers.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission, in its guidance note on “Use of marketing language related to the environment,” clarified the organization’s position on non-conforming environment-related marketing language, namely product or packaging regarding recyclability, biodegradability, and When the description of compostability does not conform to the specification, the Commission will recommend the use of language that complies with the specification in certain circumstances.

Reprinted from: China Packaging Business Network