Resources
The 2022 Plastics Market Situation report updates on the amount of plastic packaging Placed On the Market (POM), collection rates, recycling rates, and provides an update on key developments over the past few years highlighting the challenges and opportunities ahead.
- Fall in plastic packaging placed on the market
- Movement away from rigid plastic packaging towards lightweight and flexible plastics in the consumer sector.
- Domestic recycling of plastic has increased to 53%.
- Planned recycling capacity increases will be a boost but will still fall well below current levels of plastic packaging consumption.
- Collection rates are improving for plastic packaging with more flexible plastic, rigid plastics, plastic bottles and PTTs being collected at kerbside.
- Plastic Packaging
- The UK Plastics Pact
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Film and flexible packaging
- Waste management and end markets
- Market situation reports
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
- Local Authorities
- Packaging producers
- National government and departments
- Non-governmental organisations
The project demonstrated the potential to revolutionise waste recycling in a range of countries taking AI technology used in Europe, and using it in the developing world.
- Eliminating problem plastics
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Film and flexible packaging
- Waste management and end markets
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
- Local Authorities
Indian company Dalmia, working in partnership with Interface, aimed to demonstrate that through mechanical recycling, single-use plastic waste, destined for landfill or incineration, could be turned in to high value applications such as injection moulded car components and packaging.
- Eliminating problem plastics
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Film and flexible packaging
- Waste management and end markets
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
- Packaging producers
New legislation in Chile to ban single use plastics has led to the food service industry seeking alternatives.
This project trialled and tested consumer attitudes and market appetite for a compostable sachet and pipet.
- Plastic Packaging
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Film and flexible packaging
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
Read how the project helped improve the collection and use of low value plastics such as flexible film packets in the Mpumalanga Province, South Africa.
Discover how circular waste management practices can contribute to sustainable development.
- Plastic Packaging
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Waste management and end markets
- Waste management and reprocessors
The project has optimised the process which puts waste milk back into high grade products like shampoo sachets.
- Plastic Packaging
- Eliminating problem plastics
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Film and flexible packaging
- Waste management and end markets
- Hospitality and food service
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
- Eliminating problem plastics
- The UK Plastics Pact
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Reuse and refill
- Film and flexible packaging
- Food and drink
- Reducing and preventing food waste
- Courtauld Commitment
- Food Waste Reduction Roadmap
- Fresh produce sector
- Household food waste
- Behaviour change interventions
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
A review of plastic waste management practices, life cycle assessments, challenges and opportunities
This report provides an overview of current waste management practices for plastic waste in the UK and critically reviews end of life plastic waste life cycle assessments to highlight best practice waste management methods. The report further identifies challenges and potential solutions to help move UK plastic waste up the waste hierarchy.
- Plastic Packaging
- Eliminating problem plastics
- The UK Plastics Pact
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Waste management and end markets
- Re-use and recycling
In order to implement a real circular economy, we need to change the way we produce, consume and dispose of our products. The Accelerator Session ‘Plastics: from a linear problem to circular solutions’ will be delivered in collaboration by WRAP, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the World Bank on the 8th December under the frame of the 2022 World Circular Economy Forum (6th-8th December 2022) held in Kigali, Rwanda. This remote Accelerator Session will focus on the much-discussed issue of plastics, showing new data about the effect of plastic waste mismanagement and discussing the actions that many stakeholders and innovators are taking to explore and implement solutions.
- Global Plastics Pacts
Through The UK Plastics Pact we are redesigning the plastics system, working across the entire plastics value chain to reduce its climate impact, by stopping plastic waste, and the harmful emissions of new plastic production, keeping the material in the economy and out of the environment.
We are over halfway to The UK Plastics Pact targets and our 2021-22 annual report gives an honest appraisal of progress and challenges.
- Eliminating problem plastics
- The UK Plastics Pact
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Reuse and refill
- Film and flexible packaging
- Waste management and end markets
- Collections & recycling
- Consistency in collections
- Contamination prevention
- Collections and sorting
- Kerbside collection
- Re-use
- Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR)
- Market situation reports
- Hospitality and food service
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
- Local Authorities
- Packaging producers
- Trade associations
- National government and departments
- Non-governmental organisations
We need to radically transform our relationship with single-use plastic packaging and a key part of this will be the move to reuse and refill for many everyday items we purchase.
Our latest report and research explores citizen behaviours around reuse and refill. In partnership with Asda and Unilever, we shadowed research participants across the whole of their shopping journey. From pre-shop preparation to instore experience, we evaluated how our trial participants interacted with refill zones and developed and tested a series of instore behaviour change interventions. All designed to improve the reuse and refill shopping experience for our participants.
- Plastic Packaging
- Eliminating problem plastics
- The UK Plastics Pact
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Reuse and refill
- Film and flexible packaging
- Reducing and preventing food waste
- Hospitality and food service
- Retailers and brands
- Trade associations
- National government and departments
- Non-governmental organisations
Non-mechanical recycling has the potential to significantly increase the UK’s recycling rates, enable recycled content to be used back in packaging and divert valuable resources from landfill and incineration. Working alongside traditional mechanical recycling, it will have a big impact towards the redesign of our plastics system in the UK and our vision of a circular economy for plastics.
This paper sets out the WRAP’s position on the use of non-mechanical recycling technologies and how it must be effectively utilised to support the transition towards a circular economy for plastics in the UK.
- Plastic Packaging
- The UK Plastics Pact
- Plastic packaging design
- Global Plastics Pacts
- Film and flexible packaging
- Waste management and end markets
- Manufacturers
- Retailers and brands
- Waste management and reprocessors
- Local Authorities
- Packaging producers
- Trade associations
- National government and departments
- Non-governmental organisations