News & Events

An Eventful Few Months for the GlobalPSC

October and November are busy times for the Global Product Stewardship Council as we work with our international partners to share lessons from international experience and advance the GlobalPSC’s perspective.

Once again, our friends across the Tasman, including WasteMINZ and the Ministry for Environment (MfE), have collaborated to deliver a solid event in the annual WasteMINZ conference in New Zealand.

Some of the issues New Zealand faces will look familiar to anyone active on product stewardship – increased expectations from the community and government, some industries refusing to contribute their fair share, trying to enhance and expand programs and last but certainly not least, trying to secure meaningful funding for these efforts. Compounding these issues are a relatively small population, the tyranny of distance and unfortunately regular earthquakes. Ultimately, the MfE has had to step in with funding to help establish the infrastructure to start rolling out a TV takeback scheme.

New Zealand has a preferential focus on voluntary approaches through an accreditation process. Although the Minister for the Environment has the authority to prioritise products for product stewardship, they have yet to do so. The MfE has preferred to work collaboratively with stakeholders to develop and implement their product stewardship approaches.

GlobalPSC President Russ Martin chaired Day 1 of the Zero Waste Summit in Melbourne, Australia, and presented on global developments in product stewardship (available to GlobalPSC members through the Knowledge Base). Australia’s Parliamentary Secretary for Sustainability and Urban Water, Senator Don Farrell, highlighted the bipartisan support for passage of Australia’s Product Stewardship Act 2011 and gave an overview of recent developments. Others addressing product stewardship included the Australia and New Zealand Recycling Platform, Fuji Xerox and Australian Packaging Covenant.

There has been a clear convergence of product stewardship, sustainability and zero waste initiatives. All have evolved and are far more encompassing than in the past, especially as product stewardship has moved well beyond its initial end of life emphasis.

In just over a week, we’re off to present on electronics product stewardship at Electronics Recycling Asia in Guangzhou, China, then back to Australia for the Australasian Waste & Recycling Expo (AWRE) where we’ve pulled together a session on practical product stewardship implementation focusing on Australia’s new TV and computer recycling scheme. Confirmed speakers include:

• Steve Rust, Managing Director of Panasonic Australia Pty Ltd;
• Peter Brisbane, Director, Television and Computer Regulator Team for the Australian Government’s Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities;
• Carmel Dollisson, General Manager of Australia and New Zealand Recycling Platform Limited; and
• Peter Bruce, Director – Service Parts Logistics, Australia for DHL Supply Chain.

The GlobalPSC will be facilitating the panel. Click here for more information on this and other sessions at AWRE.

Then, on 27 November, the Product Stewardship Institute is providing all GlobalPSC Members with a special discount rate to participate in or obtain recordings of the webinar: “The Roles of Government and Industry in Attaining High Performing Product Stewardship Programs.”

The GlobalPSC is pleased to sponsor, participate in and otherwise support efforts such as these to draw from international experience and develop practical approaches to implementing product stewardship.

New GlobalPSC Members

We  are pleased to have the Australian Paint Manufacturers’ Federation and Planet Ark as the latest members of the GlobalPSC. Other new members will be announced shortly.