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Title page 1

Contents 4

Members 3

List of recommendations 9

Abbreviations and Terminology 14

Chair's Foreword 17

Chapter 1. Introduction and background issues 19

Referral 19

Conduct of the inquiry 19

Report Structure 20

Acknowledgements 21

Waste in Australia 21

Plastics and packaging 23

Waste prevention 24

Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 26

Review of the RAWR Act 27

Jurisdictional responsibilities 28

Role of state and territory governments 29

Role of local governments 29

International obligations 29

Parliamentary and other inquiries 32

Senate inquiry into waste and recycling (2018) 34

Senate inquiry into the Recycling and Waste Reduction Bill 2020 and related bills (2020) 36

Senate inquiry into the Product Stewardship Amendment (Packaging and Plastics) Bill (2021) 37

House of Representatives report on plastic pollution in oceans and waterways (2024) 38

'Waste' vs 'resource' 39

The need for better data 41

Current sources of data 41

Issues with existing data 43

Calls for improved data 44

Chapter 2. Current waste management and recycling practices in Australia 47

National waste policies and action plans 47

Progress against the 2019 Action Plan targets 48

Stakeholder views on the 2019 Action Plan 50

2024 Action Plan 52

Regulatory fragmentation 53

Australian Government efforts to support regulatory harmonisation 56

Calls for a national framework 58

Fragmentation in practice: kerbside collection 60

Calls for action 64

Chapter 3. Transitioning to a circular economy 66

Transitioning to a circular economy 66

International agreements 68

Australia's approach to the circular economy 69

Circular Economy Ministerial Advisory Group 70

Australia's Circular Economy Framework 78

Productivity Commission circular economy inquiry 80

Support for a circular economy 83

Challenges to achieving circularity 85

International examples of the circular economy 87

The importance of financial incentives 89

Landfill levies 90

UK Plastic Packaging Tax 92

Chapter 4. Product stewardship schemes 95

Product stewardship schemes 95

Voluntary vs mandatory product stewardship 98

The limits of voluntary schemes 98

Calls for government regulation 100

Extended producer responsibility schemes 105

Support for mandatory extended producer responsibility schemes 106

NSW product stewardship law reform 108

Minister's product stewardship priority list 110

Specific product stewardship schemes 112

Mandatory Product Stewardship for Oil Scheme 112

Tyres 113

Clothing 115

Battery stewardship 116

State-based battery stewardship 117

NSW regulation 119

The need for national leadership 120

Unprocessed scrap metal 123

Chapter 5. The need for stronger packaging reform 126

Packaging framework 127

Australian Packaging Covenant 128

Historical packaging covenants 129

2025 National Packaging Targets 131

APCO's 2030 Strategic Plan 132

Packaging reform 134

Latest packaging reform developments 134

New packaging regulatory scheme 136

Australian recycling and labelling standards 137

ReMade in Australia 138

The need for mandatory packaging regulations 139

Packaging design regulation 140

Mandating recycled content 143

Utilising government procurement rules 146

A traceability framework 149

National Framework for Recycled Content Traceability 149

The need for mandatory traceability 150

Calls to follow international examples 151

Chapter 6. Problematic waste streams 155

Australian Plastics Flows and Fates Study 155

Recycled content of plastic products 156

The unique issues with plastics 156

Environmental and human health impacts 157

National Roadmap: Harmonising action on problematic and unnecessary plastics 159

Solving Plastic Waste Cooperative Research Centre 160

The National Plastics Recycling Scheme for soft plastics 161

Soft Plastics Taskforce 162

Single-use plastics 163

Approaches to certain types of plastics 164

State-based plastic bans 164

Bioplastics 165

Waste-to-energy 166

Contaminants 168

Food and organics 170

Chapter 7. Waste export regulations and the Recycling Modernisation Fund 172

Exporting waste 172

Waste export regulations 173

The inclusion of paper and cardboard 175

Application processing times 176

Export licensing fees 177

Export licence variations 178

Consideration of an export levy 179

Disallowance of fee regulations 180

Issues raised with waste export regulations 181

Onerous licensing and exemption processes 184

Environmental impact of export regulations 185

The need for export regulations 186

Reclassification of materials 188

Import conditions 189

Recycling Modernisation Fund 191

Criticisms of the RMF 193

Improve transparency in RMF outcomes 194

Chapter 8. Committee views and recommendations 196

An industry still in crisis 196

Implementation of the circular economy 197

Productivity Commission inquiry 198

National harmonisation and regulation 199

Mandatory product stewardship schemes 201

Packaging 202

Stewardship of batteries 204

Extended producer responsibility schemes 206

Plastics packaging 206

Global plastics pollution treaty 206

Soft plastics 207

Climate and waste 208

Publication of and access to data 209

Recycling Modernisation Fund 210

Kerbside recycling 211

Export regulations 212

Imports 213

RAWR Act review 214

Utilising government procurement power 214

Coalition Senators' Dissenting Report 216

Labor Senators' Dissenting Report 220

Appendix 1. Submissions and additional information 223

Appendix 2. Public hearings and witnesses 227

Tables 49

Table 2.1. Progress towards 2019 National Waste Policy Action Plan targets (as of April 2024) 49

Table 6.1. Summary of the 2025 National Packaging Targets and progress to 2022-23 132

Table 7.1. Average time (in weeks) for export licence applications 176

Table 7.2. Fee Schedule-from 1 July 2024 to 20 November 2024 178

Table 7.3. Co-funding breakdown of RMF projects by state and territory 192

Table 7.4. Annual volumes expected to be processed by RMF projects 192

Figures 22

Figure 1.1. Waste generation and management by waste category, Australia, 2022-23 22

Figure 1.2. The waste hierarchy framework, with examples of waste prevention actions 25

Figure 2.1. Jurisdictional differences between regulatory approaches 61

Figure 3.1. A circular economy 67

Figure 3.2. Supporting recommendations-CEMAG final report 76

Figure 3.3. Australia's Circular Economy Framework at a glance 79

Figure 3.4. Six priority areas explored in the Productivity Commission's interim report 81

Figure 5.1/Figure 5.2. Australasian Recycling Label system 138

Figure 5.2/Figure 5.3. Schedule for the Australian Government Environmentally Sustainable Procurement Policy (categories and thresholds) 147

Boxes 87

Box 3.1. EU Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation 87

Box 4.1. Container deposit schemes 101