Pawsey MP, chairman of the All Party Committee on Packaging made the call at the annual Foodservice Packaging Association Environment Seminar, attended by more than 170 representatives of the foodservice packaging supply chain from manufacturers to distributors, operators, local authorities and waste recovery and re-processors.
Martin Kersh, executive director of FPA, said there was a common will for the sector to take collaborative action to deliver ‘joined up thinking’. Including, devising a simple clear way of communicating consistently with consumers about what to do with used packaging away from home; working with local authorities and operators to ensure facilities exist for recovery away from home and wider education about the value of used packaging as a viable resource.
Major operators at the seminar included Pret a Manger, Costa, Caffe Nero, McDonalds, KFC, Baxter-Storey and Sodexo, all agreed that joined up thinking is needed by the challenge is for the FPA to facilitate what happens next.
A draft Code of Practice will now be drafted with the objective of getting key parties to adopt it and will be done in the first half of 2015 to coincide with the status of the EU Waste Framework Directive and in order to influence the potential revision of the Directive.
Amongst the speakers at the seminar were Richard Swannell, director of WRAP; John Isherwood, head of sustainability at Pret a Manger; Oliver Rosevear, energy and environment manager at Costa; and Andrew Bird, chairman of the Local Authorities Recycling Advisory Committee (LARAC).