Ontario is in the process of shifting the cost burden of trash away from municipalities and onto companies that make and sell products that generate waste.
With this shift — called “extended producer responsibility” — industry now bears the full costs of recycling or recovering such items as tires, batteries, light bulbs and electronics.
Under the system, companies pay fees, based on the amount of waste material they create, to businesses that manage recycling programs, known as producer responsibility organizations (PROs).
It’s up to the companies to choose whether to pass those fees on to consumers or to absorb them as a cost of doing business. The theory is that the fees provide the companies with an incentive to reduce their packaging and other waste.
For material that fills up blue boxes — including beverage containers, paper, plastic, glass and metal — the transition to industry paying the full costs only began last year and is to be completed by 2026.
Right now, companies are seeing their blue box fees shoot upward exponentially.
The government is facing corporate pressure to change Ontario’s plan that sees industry taking on the full cost of blue box recycling programs.
The industry is “trying to shirk its environmental responsibilities,”
“If producers are not paying for this packaging, it’s going to be taxpayers, it’s going to be the environment or it’s going to be human health, and that would be a massive step backwards,” Wallis said in an interview.
They could do the same thing as for electronic waste: include an eco-fee that the consumer has to pay when purchasing the item and have the fee clearly labelled on the product to promote consumer awareness.
That would push manufacturers and retailers to move towards greener alternatives if that means they can reduce the amount of waste and work related to disposal, as well as reduce or eliminate the eco-fee when its no longer necessary.
That would also ensure proper disposal is paid upfront and the companies who are responsible to handle it are paid to do so.
It would be nice, though I do think with this electronics disposal program we have in Ontario we should and can always be doing more.
The eco fee that consumers pay for should be used as an incentive for consumers to bring the electronics back to the manufacturer. And i feel this is what ontario wants to do with the bluebox recycling program now.
An example would be a “community drop-off location” (like penguin pickup) run and paid for by the manufacturer and retailers. (Not tax payers). It could be collaboratively run between multiple retailers as a “recovery point” if they were smart.
The way the eco fee I believe is currently run is local governments charge a fee to manufacturers (which is passed to the consumer) for the municipality to operate their own hazardous waste pickup and disposal points. This fee is not recovered by the consumer. (The consumer is charged twice, once for the fee and other in taxes)
The beer store and lcbo for example change a recovery fee for glass bottles and aluminium cans. This fee is then recovered by the consumer and not passed on. (The consumer is only charged once in taxes).
It would be nice similar to a car battery where I am charged $20 extra on the new battery to bring back the old battery to recover my $20, and do the same for things like TVs, printers, phones, packagings, bags, containers.