Bronwyn Voyce, Great Plastic Rescue’s founder and chair of Circular Australia’s Industry Taskforce, says there are greater environmental and economic benefits and gains up for grabs, if big business can adopt circular principles across their supply chain.
She does warn against looking towards recycling as the sole solution though, as to address climate and systemic challenges in this space, businesses must implement substantial changes that embrace and enable material circulation.
“To manage Australia’s resources and waste volumes, a substantial increase in onshore recycling and remanufacturing capacity is crucial. However, the strength of our recycling industry hinges on the robustness of its offtake market – a viable supply requires an equally viable demand,” Voyce said.
“Our observations indicate an increasing awareness among businesses regarding their environmental footprint. The inevitability of mandatory non-financial disclosures and the growing emphasis on climate risk underscores this shift.
“However, to effectively address these challenges, it’s imperative for businesses to integrate circular economy principles throughout their supply chains.”
To demonstrate the benefits of value-chain collaboration and the commercial opportunities presented by the circular economy, in early 2023, when Adairs made the decision to proactively remove all plastic bags from their stores, Voyce partnered with the beddings and homewares retailer to redirect hundreds of thousands of plastic carry bags across its 172 retail and outlet stores to a recycling hub.
The partnership resulted in approximately one million bags (approximately 15 tonnes) being diverted from landfill.
“While not all of our bags were technically banned in every state, we felt removing them for all of our stores was the right thing to do for our environment in the longer-term,” said Ashley Gardner, chief financial officer at Adairs.
“By stopping the supply of plastic bags in-store, we estimate we’ll remove 25 million bags over the next 10 years.
“Adairs customers are encouraged to purchase our bespoke reusable bags to support our charity partner Orange Sky, who provide amazing support to those living homeless.”
Great Plastic Rescue has already recycled over 45,000kg of plastics, and are working with Australian designers, recyclers and manufacturers to turn the retired bags into limited-edition, fully circular product, which will be revealed in early 2024.
