Retailers fight back as media storm erupts over ‘excess packaging’

The Local Government Association’s ‘War on Waste’ report said that supermarkets should contribute more cash to recycling to avoid council tax rises to pay for landfill.

In statements and coverage on Tuesday (17 February) on the BBC, Sky News, ITV and in a number of newspapers, retailers and the industry have rubbished the report’s methodology and its conclusion that supermarkets should be working harder to encourage recycling.

Asda director of corporate affairs Paul Kelly described the survey, in which packaging weight was compared on the same basket of 29 products bought at eight different stores, as “fundamentally flawed”.

He said: “Retailers alone have paid £1.5bn towards improving infrastructure for recycling in the UK over the past 10 years.

“The fact that what you can recycle at home is determined by where you live and how much of a priority your local authority places on providing sufficient recycling services is simply ludicrous.”

A statement from Waitrose, which was ranked as having the heaviest packaging, called the report “misleading” and pointed out that a 500g punnet of its tomatoes was compared with a 250g punnet in other stores.

It added that the report failed to recognise any initiatives that the retailer had introduced, an accusation levelled at the LGA by a number of commentators.

A spokesperson for Sainsbury’s said; “Whilst we continue to work to reduce packaging and food waste, the biggest concern our customers have is that they can’t recycle packaging because local councils don’t collect it.

“The responsibility does not lie with just retailers but with local authorities to make facilities consistently available across all of the UK.”

Shane Monkman, Asda buying manager for packaging and the environment, said it was “frustrating” that the report had put the sector in a defensive position and that initiatives such as the Packaging Recycling Action Group and the Courtauld Commitment had not been recognised by the report.

The British Retail Consortium and Incpen, the packaging industry environmental body, this morning dismissed the report as “nonsense”. Responding to the demand for more investment, the BRC pointed out that retailers already pay around £5bn every year in business rates.

Dick Searle, chief executive of the Packaging Federation, questioned the key accusation from the LGA’s report that 40% of supermarket packaging was not recyclable.

He said: “Given that local authorities by their own admission only recycle around a third of waste, and they are saying that 60% of packaging is recyclable, they are behind on their own figures. So what are asking for?”

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