from Defra in response to my letter to David Miliband
Dear Ms Heintke
RECYCLING AND THE GREEN DOT SCHEME
Thank you for your letter of 11 June to David Miliband regarding recycling in the UK I have been asked to reply.
The Government appreciates that the UK still has a long way to go with recycling, especially in comparison with many of our European partners. However, we have made excellent progress since publishing Waste Strategy 2000 and plan a lot more – including proposals for household waste recycling and composting targets of 50% by 2020. There is also strong Government support for recycling, including:
To householders through the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP)’s national Recycle Now! campaign and schools via dedicated sections of the Recycle Now website and the Eco Schools programme.
To local authorities through various funding streams and by setting statutory annual recycling and composting targets and by providing a variety of expert advice and extra performance-related funding.
To business and industry by the Landfill Tax Value is returned to businesses by the Businesses Resource Efficiency and Waste (BREW) programme that funds the free consultancy service Envirowise and other support programmes.
To all sectors through WRAP – established in 2001 to develop efficient markets for recycled materials and products, and business support to emerging recycling businesses. More information can be found at www.wrap.org.uk
Defra officials liaise closely with other member states when developing waste management policies. The Waste Strategy for England 2007 contains several examples of this:
The Green Dot system is used in several member states to transpose the requirements of the EU Directive on Packaging and Packaging Waste. The Green Dot is a licensed trademark which denotes compliance with an authorised packaging recovery scheme in other European Union member states. Its use indicates that a financial contribution has been paid to a national packaging recovery company, set up in accordance with the principles defined in the EU Directive and the national law which transposes it.
The Green Dot is not a recycling symbol, although it is often misinterpreted as such, so should not be used to denote general recyclability or recycled content.
The Green Dot system is not used in the UK; producer responsibility obligations are fulfilled via a different method. The management of packaging and packaging waste is covered by two sets of Regulations in the UK, the Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 2007 and the Packaging (Essential Requirements) Regulations 2003 (as amended). The Packaging Waste Regulations require producers to buy packaging waste recovery notes (PRNs), or the export equivalent (PERNs), to demonstrate that they have financed a certain amount of recycling.
Introducing the Green Dot system, therefore, would simply mean changing the system we have used in the UK to implement the provision of the Packaging Directive, rather than extending producer responsibility.
The approach that has been taken by the UK is unique and was formulated and agreed with industry following the adoption of the EU Directive on packaging and packaging waste.
Yours sincerely
X.Y.
Defra – Customer Contact Unit
Virgin Response from 4th June 2007-10-17
Dear Martina
Thank you for submitting your interest in the Virgin Earth Challenge.
As we hope you’ll understand with such a lot at stake, it is important that we protect your and our interests in the process of assessing submissions for the Earth challenge. The first step in that process is for you to complete and submit an entry form. You’ll find a copy, together with the Terms and Conditions, at www.virginearth.com. Please send us a completed copy as soon as you can! We’ll then send you a contract to complete and we can get on with considering your submission.
Thanks for taking part in the Earth Challenge. We look forward to hearing from you!
Best of luck,
Yours sincerely
X.Y. Virgin Earth Challenge Assistant
My comment: Okay, I send it to the Virgin Earth Challenge address in the absence of having Richard Branson’s private address as this was topically the most related of all the Virgin addresses. However, did I ever mention that I wanted to submit it as an entry to the Earth Challenge. Does anybody pay attention anymore when reading the post?!
