With waste generation increasing and landfill space becoming increasingly limited in South Africa, alongside growing global regulatory requirements, local producers are facing mounting pressure to adopt sustainable resource management practices.

Extended producer responsibility (EPR), resource recovery and waste innovation can play an important role in the transition towards a circular economy.

According to producer responsibility organisation (PRO) Petco’s website, EPR is a waste management strategy that supports the sustainable organisation and financing of specific waste streams.

Petco notes that EPR was voluntary in South Africa until the Section 18 regulations of the National Environmental Management: Waste Act came into effect in 2021. Since then, it has become mandatory for producers to take full responsibility for the products they place on the market, including their post-consumer collection, sorting and recycling.

According to the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE), the primary objectives of the EPR system include establishing an online registration platform and providing producers and PROs with easy access and a quick registration process.

During a circular economy webinar hosted by Creamer Media last month, DFFE director of chemicals and waste policy and information management Jeremia Sibande explained that EPR aims to extend producers’ responsibility for managing waste throughout a product’s life cycle, including in the post-consumer stage.

Since EPR regulations came into effect in 2021, the DFFE has recorded a number of successes, with over 2 000 companies having registered on the department’s EPR portal.

The department developed notices for six classes of products regulated under these EPR regulations: paper and packaging products, electrical and electronic equipment products, lighting products, lubricant oil, pesticides, and portable batteries.

Companies are also required to report according to the targets set out in the notices, including targets for collection, recycling, product design and reuse.

“We are trying to divert waste as far as possible away from the landfill site through those strategies,” Sibande added.

However, he laments that noncompliance with EPR regulations remains a challenge: “This is one problem that we are battling with . . . It is not government alone that has to monitor the compliance.”

Most municipalities have not yet come on board with regard to working with PROs in implementating the EPR system, but the department is assisting municipalities with compliance.

Sibande also noted that the DFFE has acknowledged weaknesses in the implementation of EPR over the past five years and will conduct a comprehensive review of the system

Petco CEO Telly Chauke highlighted how EPR can become a catalyst for innovation and circular economy growth, noting that it should be regarded less as a compliance factor and more as a lever for economic activity.

Although South Africa has great industrialisation and local manufacturing ambitions, there is a lack of policy coherence and enabling measures to protect existing installations in terms of recycling capacity and stimulating economic activity.

In terms of installed capacity, there are challenges related to energy security and affordability, while incentives for recyclers in municipal spaces remain limited.

She highlighted the importance of creating a coherent policy landscape across South Africa’s economic sectors, including infrastructure, fiscal incentives and tax reforms to ensure the sustainability and profitability of existing installed capacity.

Chauke also stressed the importance of protecting existing capacity and scaling up local manufacturing capacity while highlighting the need for technology and digital innovation in the waste management sector, as well as the potential for local talent to contribute to these efforts, particularly through EPR.

“I think there’s room for South Africa to grow in that space because often these technologies are imported or, certainly, the knowledge is imported. And I think we could bring young people and young minds into play in terms of innovating around the digital space.”

Maintaining Competitiveness

National Cleaner Production Centre South Africa (NCPC-SA) skills senior project manager Maggie Mashau discussed the importance of resource efficiency and cleaner production in improving competitiveness while reducing waste generation, energy use and material consumption.

She said South African manufacturers should view resource efficiency and the circular economy as a business competitiveness strategy rather than simply an environmental agenda.

She added that resource efficiency interventions could improve productivity, reduce operational costs and strengthen compliance with environmental regulations, while producing more with fewer resources builds manufacturers’ resilience and competitiveness, helping to unlock local and international markets.

Global regulatory frameworks were also discussed, including developments such as the EU’s Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation, which introduces stringent requirements across the packaging value chain, particularly in relation to imports and exports.

Speaking during a question-and-answer session, Sibande noted that the DFFE is engaging with the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition to ensure that South African products remain globally competitive, emphasising that “it’s work in progress”.

Practical Steps

EnviroServ national on-site manager Yolandi Holm stressed that it is important for organisations to clearly understand what waste they generate and where the generation points are to improve resource recovery and reduce disposal costs.

She also emphasised the importance of partnering with the right service providers.

“When we get to a customer site, we ensure that we understand the full process, what waste streams are being generated where, and then we can start putting a sustainability plan together and a waste management plan . . . that will support their objectives. I always believe in separation at source. That . . . is the most important part.”

Meanwhile, Petco has observed that its members are increasingly shifting away from packaging that is traditionally not recyclable at scale in favour of materials such as polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which can be collected and recycled at scale more effectively.

The organisation has also recently noted “massive decisions” to replace what would conventionally be considered a particular form of packaging that preserves the recipe in beverages with transparent PET packaging.

“Ultimately, that commitment to PET is because, for 20-odd years, it’s enjoyed a great degree of investment voluntarily from producers to invest in the collection network, invest in building recycling capacity, and so on,” Chauke explained.

While significant progress is being made, she highlighted the challenge of reaching scale in terms of good decision-making regarding packaging forms that are recyclable at scale.

“I think the easiest response to that type of challenge is that commercial decisions and investment decisions need to be made that facilitate producers’ investing in the changeover.”

To address this, Petco has introduced interventions aimed at increasing the scale of collection and recycling by adding value to these materials.

“Before these materials were collected, they weren’t perceived to have economic value. And so, by building or developing end-uses . . . [and] end-of-life solutions for these products, you retain value for the material for as long as possible in the system.”

Petco is researching the economic factors of certain nonrecyclable materials on existing recycling streams, how to best identify recyclable packaging and how to incentivise producers to make those shifts.

Holm noted that the organisation’s members were recognising that, for their products to be globally competitive, they needed to achieve sustainability outcomes.

“We need to ramp up our efforts for investment in good design, as well as in collection systems and having municipalities functioning and doing their part in terms of sustaining collection and making sure that they’re disincentivising landfilling of recyclable materials – so, a mixed bag of solutions,” she concluded.