Supermarket soft plastic recycling collapse sees stockpiles of rubbish

This woman had the best intentions at heart but now her embarrassing mistake is doomed for failure.

OPINION

Well, this is embarrassing – but mostly very concerning.

Just looking at this stockpile of soft plastics in our garage now destined for landfill is giving me anxiety after the collapse of the REDcycle program. And here I was so proud of my efforts – although annoyed at myself that I kept forgetting to drop them off during a trip to Coles or Woolies.

The piles became so big that I thought it was too awkward to take them in all at once and attempt to squeeze them into those little bin holes, and then you (ashamedly) accumulate a new bag by the time you get around to taking them in and hello plastic snowball effect!

I admit, ours was a flawed system, but the REDcycle system itself has been something to be applauded. Growing in popularity since its inception over a decade ago (hard to believe it’s been that long when some people still don’t know about it or do it), more Australians were filling up those bins and trying to cut down on single-use plastics and contributing to landfill.

Like me, you might have seen the news of the REDcycle collapse coming, which is why I feel particularly bad I didn’t take my bags in sooner. For months I had seen piles of soft plastics bags on the docks of the supermarkets, but I’d hoped there was just so much demand they couldn’t keep up.

Alas, for those same months, the plastics that have been diligently collected and dropped off by customers at nearly 2000 supermarkets across the country haven’t been being recycled at all, instead piling up in a REDcycle warehouse.

Woolworths said it was blindsided by the “disappointing” news, while Coles confirmed it would follow Woolies’ lead and suspend its collections.

‘Just looking at this stockpile of soft plastics in our garage now destined for landfill is giving me anxiety after the collapse of the REDcycle program.’

REDcycle said its recycling partners had temporarily stopped accepting and processing soft plastics “due to several unforeseen challenges exacerbated by the pandemic”.

The situation is devastating, with REDcycle saying consumer recycling of soft plastic has grown “exponentially” in recent years, with a 350 per cent increase since 2019.

I started trying to eliminate soft plastics a couple of years before that, attempting Plastic Free July and as anyone who’s attempted this challenge would know, it’s extremely difficult. I failed on day one forgetting to ask for a drink with no straw, back before paper options had become the norm (yay!).

The problem is companies don’t make it easy and back then you’d certainly get strange looks taking your reusable containers to the butcher to ask them to put the meat in.

It was also more expensive to fill jars at bulk food stores and so REDcycle provided a guilt-free alternative if you had to resort to buying packet pasta – until now.

Adding post-single life kids to the equation, pandemic lockdowns and the rising cost of living, I’m sad to say my soft plastic avoidance efforts went downhill.

So what now? I saw one suggestion that we should keep dropping soft plastics off at supermarkets to put pressure on them to come up with a solution, but that’s only going to make it harder for them and they aren’t the bad guys.

There are suggestions people should keep dropping soft plastics off at supermarkets to put pressure on them to come up with a solution.

To their credit, the supermarkets have been investing in the REDcycle initiative and seem to be actively doing what they can to address the issue, even before now.

Woolworths has said it’s working through a range of options with the Australian Food and Grocery Council, the Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation, and the recycling industry “to support the future of soft plastic recycling”.

And REDcycle says it has been working tirelessly behind the scenes to “find other processing solutions and end markets”.

It seems to me the pressure needs to be put on the end markets and companies investing in more sustainable packaging, rather than coming up with seemingly convenient and unnecessary new product offerings.

Just recently a major biscuit company released a multipack product with individually wrapped servings. But how hard is it to buy a traditional packet and put your biscuits in a container? It might add a few mere seconds to your day.

And we all know how frustrating it is when you see individually wrapped fruit and vegetables or bags of potatoes cheaper than the loose ones – that is, in fact, something the supermarkets need to do get better at.

It’s great to see small or new Aussie businesses embracing sustainable packaging choices, even though it ultimately costs more for them to do so and trying to make these options more affordable for customers.

But recently it got me thinking, is there any point buying a more sustainable shampoo bottle if you’re still buying individually wrapped biscuits?

Is going all in what will make a difference or does every little bit count?

I know I have to lift my game now that soft plastics are temporarily out of the equation. I’m also on a mission to go down the reusable nappy path (wish me luck!)

Until now I had been thinking our local council should switch to weekly yellow bin collections instead of red because our yellow bin is always overflowing, and we never fill the red.

Sadly, we’ll now be filling the red bin with our accumulation of soft plastics and more until a solution to the REDcycle problem can be found.

Still, I’m not sure I can face binning it, but It’s either that or becoming a soft plastics hoarder and surely that’s only going to add to the problem.

It all feels very backwards, stressful and alarming – and we need to better.

Come on Australia, let’s get our act together to save ourselves - and me - this embarrassment.

Stephanie Bedo is a freelance writer.