Legislation

What is it?

The Producer Responsibility Obligations regulations  set targets for the British industry for the recovery and recycling of packaging waste.

There are three ways to comply with the Producer Responsibility Obligations:

•    join a registered compliance scheme
•    follow the individual route by calculating and fulfilling your own obligations
•    if your business is small you can use the allocation method.

(Click here for more details on how to comply)

Who is affected?

You must comply with the Producer Responsibility Obligations if your business:

•    Handles more than 50 tonnes of packaging in a year and has a turnover of more than £2million (based on the previous financial year)
•    If your business belongs to a group of companies these requirements apply to the total amount of packaging handled by the group and the group’s total annual turnover.
•    The obligations apply to the total amount of packaging that your business handles, not the amount of packaging waste that your business produces.

What must you do?

To comply to Producer Responsibility Obligations , you must:
•    register with your environmental regulator
•    pay for the recovery and recycling of a certain amount of your packaging waste
•    provide your environmental regulator with evidence that you have met your obligations.

To find out more about Packaging Producer Responsibility regulations, please visit the Environmental Agency regulations website.