A recent report says that a new Philippine law meant to hold companies responsible for their plastic waste is showing “promising results,” with most of the country’s largest plastic packaging producers going beyond the minimum recovery target. But critics say the law has several shortcomings. The Philippines’ Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) law of 2022 requires large companies with more than 100 million pesos ($1.7 million) in assets to take responsibility for reducing their plastic waste. They’re expected to recover 20% of their plastic waste by the end of 2023 and 80% by 2028, preventing it from entering the environment. Companies can comply with the recovery targets on their own or authorize a “producer responsibility organization” like the nonprofit PCX Solutions, which published the report. The report estimates based on available data that 626,725 metric tons of plastic packaging in the Philippines need to be recovered annually. By the end of 2023, the first milestone, 947 companies had registered for the country’s EPR program and helped recover and divert 163,000 metric tons of post-consumer plastic packaging waste, the report says. While government is yet to validate the numbers, the report added that this suggests plastic packaging recovery has already surpassed the 20% target for the year. However, not all firms obliged to comply with the EPR law have done so, the report says, suggesting education and awareness to improve compliance are still needed. The report also noted several challenges, including addressing decades of legacy plastic pollution, creating the supply and demand…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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