Australia’s peak retail body, the Australian Retailers Association, has applauded the leadership and collaboration demonstrated by Woolworths and Coles, aiming to save thousands of tonnes of recyclable material from landfill.
ARA CEO Paul Zahra said the plan by the supermarket giants is a commendable move to help ensure environmental preservation.
“We applaud ARA Members Coles and Woolworths who have gone above and beyond, taking steps to intervene in providing a solution,” he said.
“Australians and supermarkets were badly let down with the collapse of the RedCycle scheme.”
“Supermarkets helped lead the market with this scheme which RedCycle undertook to deliver and thousands of customers took extraordinary initiative to save their soft plastics and drop them in supermarket collection bins with the goal of environmental preservation
“Thankfully, after a period of uncertainty – we’re much closer to that goal being achieved.”
“The commitment by two of the country’s biggest grocery competitors for a worthy cause is a fantastic demonstration of leadership and the success that can be attained from collaboration around sustainability efforts.
“The path to a circular economy is extremely challenging – this issue has raised a number of the broad challenges we face across industry, government and consumer in creating sustainable solutions within a country that doesn’t have the scale of many other countries in addressing the issue.
Single plastics make up a third of environmental waste and are a leading cause of ocean ecosystem decline across the world.
The ARA also encourages Government to support the development and implementation of collection processes, so there are multiple options available.
“Australians are incredibly eager to put in the work to reduce plastic waste, and it is extremely important that we have the infrastructure and processes in place to support them.”
“It is essential that regulators work pragmatically with retailers to allow enough time for a complete solution and that suppliers also play a part in systemic change moving forward.”
