Statement on REDcycle

The Australian Food and Grocery Council (AFGC) has recently been made aware of the challenges currently facing REDcycle.

We will continue engaging with the REDcycle team, retailers, APCO and the broader community.

The REDcycle program has been a significant contributor to the recycling ecosystem and consumers will undoubtedly be concerned about what this means for soft plastic collection. Since becoming aware of the challenges, interested parties have been working on potential options to address the collection of soft plastics.

For the longer term, there is a need for a larger scale program to recycle soft plastics. To this end, the AFGC and leading Australian food and grocery manufacturers have been developing a scheme for nationwide soft plastics recycling underpinned by kerbside collection of the material.

This week, the first in a series of kerbside soft plastic collection trials has started, with some residents in certain local government areas across the country already participating. These trials will enable the entire supply chain to invest with confidence in a soft plastics recycling scheme for the future. We see kerbside collection as vital and the only way Australia can be a leader in advanced recycling.

There is enormous demand for recycled food-grade soft plastics from manufacturers and Australia is well-placed to be a global leader off the back of nationwide kerbside collection of soft plastics.