Waste Figures Promising, But Not Yet on Target
The Government Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has recently released its estimates for the amount of residual waste generated in England between 2019 and 2023.
The good news from the figures for everyone interested in recycling is that in 2023, the estimated amount of residual waste in England was 58.7 million tonnes, representing a decrease of 1.9% from 2022 (59.8 million tonnes), and a reduction of 8.9% from 2019 (64.4 million tonnes).
58.7 million tonnes is still an enormous amount of waste, but the quantity is going down while the population is going up, so it reflects a significant decrease in waste produced per person. This estimate corresponds to 1017.0 kilograms per person of residual waste, representing a decrease of 2.9% from 2022 (1047.3 kilograms per person), and a decrease of 11.2% from 2019 (1145.3 kilograms per person). The decrease is clearly welcome news – but it still means that every person in England is responsible for waste equivalent to the weight of a Volkswagen Beetle or an adult male hippopotamus!
For environmentalists, the DEFRA announcement also had positive news regarding waste going to landfill, with an estimated decrease of 15.3% between 2019 and 2023, from 45.5 million tonnes to 38.5 million tonnes.
While the report should be welcomed for the decreases in waste being produced, it still falls short of the interim targets set out in the 25 Year Environment Plan, published in 2018.
Many of the missed targets can be attributed to the pandemic, but the pace of change needs to increase to get back on track.
The first revision of the Plan, published in 2023, included the following interim targets, by 31 January 2028 to:
- Reduce residual waste (excluding major mineral waste) produced per person by 24%.
- Reduce residual waste (excluding major mineral waste) in total tonnes by 21%.
- Reduce municipal residual waste produced per person by 29%.
- Reduce residual municipal food waste produced per person by 50%.
- Reduce residual municipal plastic waste produced per person by 45%.
- Reduce residual municipal paper and card waste produced per person by 26%.
- Reduce residual municipal metal waste produced per person by 42%.
- Reduce residual municipal glass waste produced per person by 48%.
To get back on track, there are a number of initiatives that Casepak thinks the Government can turbocharge. For example, banning the supply of more single use plastics, implementing further consistent recycling for households and businesses, expanding Deposit Return Scheme for drinks containers and implementing Extended Producer Responsibility to move the cost of dealing with household packaging waste from taxpayers and councils to businesses.
While the direction of travel towards more recycling and less waste is definitely correct, as a country we just need to speed up a little!