Government dashes hopes for progress on industry-wide waste

The GetReal campaign team is deeply disappointed to discover that the Government has backed down on introducing a key tool to tackle industry waste.

GetReal were one of nearly 250 submitters who put in submissions on waste minimisation last year. GetReal spokesperson Sue Coutts says that the consultation process now appears to have been a farce.

“We’ve had no information on the outcome of the consultation and no summary of the submissions was ever produced.

“It’s only when Environment Minister Nick Smith was put on the spot by a written Green Party question that we discovered the Government has decided not to require mandatory product stewardship for any waste stream,” said Ms Coutts.

Originally the Government discussion document included mandatory product stewardship for three waste streams: agricultural chemicals, used oil and refrigerant gases.

Campaign spokesperson Sue Coutts said the Government is showing a lack of backbone in implementing the Waste Minimisation Act 2008, which makes provision for mandatory product stewardship.

“Mandatory product stewardship would support businesses that take responsibility for their supply chains, by solving the free rider problem.

“The idea that individual firms can establish effective product stewardship programmes on their own is crazy. Everyone in the supply chain has to work together. We need our government to create an operating environment where that can happen,” she said.

“Now it looks like there won’t be any priority product list at all. We get told that our submissions are being taken into account when decisions are made but everything is happening behind closed doors. We expect more transparency.

“We had big hopes for the Waste Minimisation Act when it went through. It is pretty disheartening to find out that it’s sitting on the shelf beside the NZ Waste Strategy gathering dust.”

ENDS

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