The Australian Food and Grocery Council (AFGC) has pointed to the latest national litter index as evidence that there are better, cheaper and more effective waste reduction alternatives to container deposit schemes.
Victoria has achieved Australia’s best reduction of littered beverage containers without having a Container Deposit Scheme (CDS), according to the Keep Australia Beautiful National Litter Index survey released by the Australian Packaging Covenant (APC).
The index found an across the board drop in litter in Victoria which outstripped many other states, including South Australia which has a CDS.
AFGC CEO Gary Dawson said the national litter results highlighted the effectiveness and success of current industry-based recycling and litter programs which reduce overall litter by addressing all waste streams.
“Victoria impressively leads the nation in reducing litter with its volume of discarded litter down 17 per cent by item and average volume decreasing by 13 per cent,” Dawson said.
“One of the major reasons for Victoria’s success is its innovative enforcement regulations ensuring that industry, governments and environmental groups like Keep Australia Beautiful work together to reduce litter across all waste streams.”
Dawson said Victorians benefit from having the world’s best practice kerbside recycling scheme, and litter rates that are the best in Australia, with 54 per cent less litter by item and 52 per cent less by volume than the national average.
“Victoria has achieved success without having a CDS, which research has shown to be a much more expensive model and would cost between $1.4 billion to $1.76 billion to set up,” he said.
“Alternative plans to improve recycling rates being proposed by industry are 28 times less expensive and include significant funding to community groups and local governments to clean up litter hot spots, and more importantly, keep them clean into the future.”
The chief executive of the APC, Stan Moore, said the index indicated a continuing downward trend nationally in the occurrence of litter, but Victoria had set a particularly strong example by outperforming other states.
“Victoria has taken a collaborative approach that has evolved from its first steps back under the Kennett government,” Moore said.
The National Litter Index is Australia’s only national annual quantitative measure of what litter occurs where and in what volume, based on counts taken twice a year at 983 sites across Australia. The research is funded by all state and territory governments and the APC.
The AFGC says the latest National Litter Index shows there are better, cheaper and more effective waste reduction alternatives to container deposit schemes.
