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Plastic use amongst CPG companies is rising, despite global commitments to plastic use objectives promoted by Ellen MacArthur Foundation and WRAP. This is because the objectives allow corporations to focus on using ‘recyclable’ plastic and downplay a key strategy that could quickly make a difference: reuse.

Business360 research shows how consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies are struggling to make progress reducing their reliance on plastic.

One of the best ways to see this is through the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (EMF) Global Commitment Progress Report, the latest data of which runs to 2021 and shows how overall plastic use across brand and retail signatory companies in 2021 is up 5.6% on 2018. Virgin plastic usage went back up to 2018 levels.

Growth in total new plastic packaging since 2018 for some of the large FMCG signatories was much higher, including McCormick (23.1%,), McCain 16.1% and Mars (10.2%), and the two largest users showed strong growth too:  Coca-Cola (8.9%) and PepsiCo (8.7%).

Data for individual FMCG companies also shows continued heavy reliance on virgin fossil fuel-based plastic.

These companies have been focusing on reducing plastic use for years now, and especially virgin plastic, so how can this be?

Some history

Back in 2016 Ellen MacArthur Foundation and World Economic Forum worked to develop the New Plastic Economy as a framework[1] to reduce plastic use. In 2018, and to great fanfare, Ellen MacArthur Foundation promoted the New Plastic Economy, with WRAP promoting its Plastic Pacts ‘enabled by the New Plastics Economy’[2], and companies signed on.

Countries and companies that together represent over 20% of global plastic use committed to plastic use abatement measures with a 2025 deadline.

Signatories agreed to a range of targets:

Signatory companies have been working to meet these targets and each year publish performance data.

But instead of falling, plastic use is rising, so what’s gone wrong?

In our view, this outcome was inevitable because the framework is flawed. The commitments have no limits on overall plastic use and instead allow companies to focus on ‘recyclability’ of plastic packaging, which is of little use.

Authors of the Business360 report predicted a poor outcome in a 2019 article on LinkedIn and since various commentators have questioned the wisdom of these goals. So what’s the problem?

The ‘recyclable’ cop out

Both WRAP and Ellen MacArthur Foundation include the target that ‘100% of plastic packaging is reusable, recyclable, or compostable’. By including these three strategies as options, Ellen MacArthur Foundation/WRAP let signatories choose the easiest, regardless of which best lowers plastic use. And of these three options, two are effective but difficult and one is relatively easy. And you guessed it, the easy one doesn’t lower plastic use at all.

Making packaging reusable so the same packaging is used many times over is a good solution since it lowers overall usage, even if the packaging remains plastic. Reuse also goes hand in hand with reducing plastic packaging since multiple uses can make more costly non-plastic packaging (stainless steel, glass, china etc.) economically viable alternatives. Reuse solutions can for many products quickly and economically prevent 60% of plastic waste and sometimes over 95%. But while making packaging reusable is technically feasible, creating a business model to support it requires rethinking supply chains and changing consumer behaviours. Both are doable but mean companies must change how they do things, adding costs and lowering margins, which they’re reluctant to do.

Having packaging that composts would be a great help, but making packaging compostable remains technically challenging, is a long way from commercial viability and could only ever work for limited use cases.

But making packaging ‘recyclable’ is comparatively easy. There are some challenges, but for the most part it means removing plastics that aren’t recycled and replacing it with types of plastic that are or could be.

Switching out non-recyclable plastic for ‘recyclable’ plastic is a manageable task for corporations and unsurprisingly it's the one they’ve focused on. A massively disproportionate share of the effort by CPG companies is going into ensuring 100% of its plastic packaging is ‘recyclable’.

We see this from the latest Ellen MacArthur Foundation data, which show the strategies companies have used to make progress.

Against the objective of ensuring that ‘100% of plastic packaging is reusable, recyclable or compostable’, companies are making incremental progress. In 2021 it stood at 65.4%, up 1.7 points on 2020. But ‘recyclable’ accounts for all the progress; the share of packaging that is compostable remains at zero and the share of packaging that is reusable fell 0.1 points (it’s at such a low base this decline doesn’t affect the overall figures).

But what is ‘recyclable’?

On the surface, making plastic ‘recyclable’ sounds like a laudable goal, but dig a little detail deeper and it becomes a house of cards.

Plastic is considered ‘recyclable’ if there is a 30% or more post-consumer recycling rate in multiple regions, collectively representing at least 400 million inhabitants[3]. By picking high recycling countries, like much of the EU and South Korea etc., signatory companies can piece together an area of 400 million people that reach this bar. But 400 million people is just 5% of the world's population. Across much the world, recycling is very limited and often entirely absent. Allowing plastics recycled at 30% by just 5% of the world's population means that plastics recycled at a global average rate of 1.5% could still qualify as ‘recyclable’.

It's now well-established that most plastic doesn’t get recycled and, globally, its unlikely to exceed 30% this century. OECD says the share of plastic waste successfully recycled was 9% in 2019 and is projected to rise to 17% in 2060[4]. Making plastic ‘recyclable’ is largely meaningless.

But even when plastic gets recycled, it’s not a great help. Recycled plastic usually needs to be blended with a larger amount of virgin plastic before it can be reused, over 99% of which comes from fossil fuels^[5]. Building demand for recycled plastic merely ensures ongoing dependency on fossil fuels.

Brands stamp ‘recyclable’ in bold on their packaging and consumers take comfort from it, but companies know it’ll make no difference.

And all the while WRAP and Ellen MacArthur Foundation provide cover, checking progress against commitments that will not make a dent in plastic use or the amount of plastic that goes to landfill or leaks to the environment.

Time to pivot to reuse

This is an opportunity for WRAP and Ellen MacArthur Foundation to take stock, address their flawed frameworks and refocus on goals that will make a difference.

Specifically, we need targets and corporate commitments for a meaningful and rising share of their products by volume sold through reuse solutions.

[1] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_New_Plastics_Economy.pdf

[2] https://wrap.org.uk/taking-action/plastic-packaging/initiatives/the-uk-plastics-pact

[3] https://emf.thirdlight.com/link/Reporting-Resources-2022/@/preview/2

[4]  https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/environment/global-plastics-outlook_aa1edf33-en

[5] https://www.ciel.org/issue/fossil-fuels-plastic/

Today we heard that our refill-reuse pilot had been covered in a local paper,  Sakal, a leading Marathi language newspaper in the state of Maharashtra.

We are working on a translation, but meanwhile please enjoy it in its technicolour glory…

We're starting to get social!

Back in 2016 Ellen MacArthur Foundation and World Economic Forum worked to develop the New Plastic Economy^[1] as a framework to reduce plastic use. In 2018, and to great fanfare, Ellen MacArthur Foundation promoted the New Plastic Economy, with WRAP promoting its Plastic Pacts ‘enabled by the New Plastics Economy’^[2], and companies signed on.

Countries and companies that together represent over 20% of global plastic use committed to plastic use abatement measures with a 2025 deadline.

Signatories agreed to a range of targets:

Signatory companies have been working to meet these targets and each year publish performance data.

But instead of falling, plastic use is rising, so what’s gone wrong?

In our view, this outcome was inevitable because the framework is flawed.

The key issue is that the global commitments have no reductions or even limits on overall plastic use. The only commitment that could feasibly reduce plastic usage is the goal that by 2025 ‘100% of plastic packaging is reusable, recyclable, or compostable’. (Making packaging recyclable or compostable wouldn’t reduce plastic use but making it reusable would.)

By including these three strategies as options, Ellen MacArthur Foundation/WRAP let signatories choose the easiest, regardless of which best lowers plastic use. And you guessed it, the easy one, making plastic ‘recyclable’, doesn’t lower plastic use at all!

Excellent!

Selecting ‘recyclability’ as a key metric has distracted and delayed efforts to address plastic waste from packaging.

This should not be a surprise. We predicted a poor outcome in a 2019 article on LinkedIn, in 2020 published analysis showing how plastic use wasn’t falling and in a separate 2020 report predicted companies wouldn’t meet their targets.

It’s been clear for a while now that signatory companies wouldn’t reduce plastic use, or even meet the global commitments. Ellen MacArthur Foundation now agrees that plastic use continues to rise and that ‘most signatories will almost certainly miss the 2025 target of 100% reusable, recyclable, or compostable plastic packaging’.

[1] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_New_Plastics_Economy.pdf

[2] https://wrap.org.uk/taking-action/plastic-packaging/initiatives/the-uk-plastics-pact

These last few weeks we’ve finally launched our refill-reuse pilot at select kirana stores in and around Aurangabad.

We faced numerous uncertainties – would stores cooperate? Would women even want to try an unknown shampoo brand? If they tried, would they come back for refills, and do so reliably?

The only way to find out was to launch and see what happens

That's just what we've done, launching first at one kirana store, then another and rolling forwards until we also launched to serve an entire village

Data is still coming in and we’ll add later posts about this and other findings, but the long and short of it is that it works!

Women quickly get the concept of refill and reuse. They think it's a good idea and are proud to use their bottles. Kirana stores, while sometimes hesitant, get on board and are prepared to put in the effort to make it work. Women are starting to show some loyalty, and some have refilled a handful of times already. A promising start

We’ll add more details in the New Year, but for now, here’s a selection of photos from recent launches…

Plastic waste is a problem here in the UK but it's a far bigger problem in many Asian countries where product is often sold in small plastic sachets that can't be recycled. Instead, these sachets commonly get washed away and escape to waterways and are a primary contributor to ocean microplastic. And along the way they clog drains and cause flooding, creating unsanitary conditions.

For about a year we've been working with a NGO and partner in India on a refill-reuse idea for low-income consumers. Much of the work requires developing a system to enable a reuse system, but a large component centres on consumer outreach and education.

10% of every penny you spend on this site goes to support this project and we thank you for your help!

Read more about this project at our sister site called Beat The Sachet.

In case you've ever wondered, clearing up old plastic waste from a riverbed is a really shit job.

Not that it isn't important. It's necessary, and about the only way to get heavily polluted rivers back to health. Never fully remediated and pristine, because this stuff endures decades and centuries, but functional and healthier.

But actually doing the work is no picnic. It’s slow, continually bending over or crouching down to pull plastic from the soil to put the waste into a large (plastic) sack. And it can smell really bad too.

Our local partner in Aurangabad, EcoSattva, organises clean-ups as part of its wider environmental work. We were lucky enough to join one cleaning up the Kham River. We joined a range of volunteers early on a Sunday morning. EcoSattva does a great job of making it fun with a local band playing afterwards with food and refreshments too.

Here are some images…

Riyō is a range of sophisticated natural and organic beauty products.

Hand wash, hand moisturiser and body lotion come in beautiful amber glass bottles; shower products (body wash, shampoo and conditioner) in matte black stainless steel, all with elegant matte black stainless steel push pumps.

Specially developed here in the UK with botanically driven formulations, Riyō uses only the finest natural and organic ingredients, all without animal testing.

By selecting quality natural ingredients, botanical extracts and essential oil blends, Riyō products avoid the synthetic and cheaper ingredients common to most personal care and beauty products

Riyō is named after the Japanese for reuse, Sai Riyō (再利用), and like all products sold on RefillwithLESS, we provide a bulk container from which you can do your own refills to save money and prevent plastic waste.

Read more about Riyō products as well as see the full range.

Colours and look & feel are critical for a brand, and we wanted to test ideas with our target market.

We prepared various options to convey different ideas and put them out to test. Here's a sample…

No clear winner emerged, but findings did support earlier consumer research that found a strong image of a woman with long, healthy hair is a major positive. We learned too that using Marathi with some supporting English would be a good combination – Marathi would set us apart and play well with the consumers while the English would provide a hint of sophistication.

More controversial was the colour. We had our logo, but how should we represent it? We settled on three options…

For a long while red was the front runner and seen as a positive option by some because it would be a distinctive colour for shampoo. But it reminded me too much of RID and other anti-lice treatments, so I was relieved when green drew level and we caste a deciding vote

After days of silence and no tracking updates, I suddenly got a call saying our parcel was out for delivery and about to arrive in 10 minutes. A customs fee was due, but at least it was here.

It looked tattered and battered, but everything inside was fine.

Hallelujah!