Making Producers Responsible for Their Waste

How Extended Producer Responsibility rules make companies responsible for collecting and recycling packaging, plastics and electronics, and how the system works in India.

Who should pay to manage the waste from packaging, plastic and electronics? Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) says: the producers who put them on the market.

The idea

EPR makes manufacturers, importers and brand owners responsible for their products after use, by:

Collecting and recycling a share of what they sell.
Financing waste management.

This internalises the externality of waste, encouraging producers to design less wasteful, more recyclable products.

India’s EPR rules

Plastic packaging: EPR guidelines under the Plastic Waste Management Rules, strengthened in 2022, set targets for collection, recycling and use of recycled content.
E-waste: the E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2022 set collection targets for electronics makers.
Batteries: rules in 2022 extended EPR to batteries.
Tyres and used oil also have EPR frameworks.

EPR credits

Producers can meet obligations by buying EPR certificates from registered recyclers who process waste, creating a market for recycling.

Challenges

Fake certificates and weak verification; audits found fraudulent certificates in some cases.
Informal recyclers who aren’t registered.
Enforcement by pollution control boards.
Low-value plastics, like multi-layered packaging, are hard to recycle.

Why it matters

Well-designed EPR can shift costs from taxpayers to producers and consumers of products, encouraging better design and recycling.

The snack company

A snack company must ensure a share of the plastic packaging it sells is collected and recycled. It buys EPR certificates from registered recyclers and redesigns some packets to use recyclable materials.

Thinking waste is only the government's responsibility

EPR makes producers responsible for collecting and recycling their products' waste.

Key takeaways

EPR makes producers responsible for their products' waste.
India strengthened EPR for plastic packaging, e-waste and batteries in 2022.
Producers can buy EPR certificates from registered recyclers.
Fake certificates and enforcement gaps are challenges.