It’s no secret that Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) for packaging is set to reshape the U.S. packaging industry, leaving many producers and packaging companies concerned about increased reporting and compliance requirements, fees, and other obligations. However, a key upside of EPR lies in its Eco-Modulation programs, which incentivize sustainable design practices and innovative packaging choices. In this blog we will explore the eco-modulation systems in EPR programs in Oregon, Colorado, California, Maine, and Minnesota.

In this blog, we cover the emerging and established frameworks for extended producer responsibility (EPR), that include packaging in their scopes, in the North American continent (including Carribean and Latin America). We cover the EPR programs and timelines of US states, Canadian provinces, Costa Rica, and The Dominican Republic.

The year 2024 has seen monumental regulatory shifts in the global packaging industry–one area in particular relates to that of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) refers to a regulatory approach in which the producers of packaging (and other products) in a defined territory are made responsible for managing the waste and externalities associated with their products—shifting the burden of packaging waste management from consumers and municipalities to the producers themselves. A large percentage of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) legislation includes requirements for identified producers to join a Producer Responsibility Organization (PRO)—often an industry led non-profit focused on working collectively to meet targets, collect and allocate fees, and more.

As 2024 continues, Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) programs for packaging in the United States continue to hit new milestones, but none are currently collecting fees from producers. In anticipation of looming reporting and fee deadlines in 5 US programs, let's explore the implementation of EPR for packaging in several Canadian provinces and learn how our neighbors in the north are managing packaging waste and externalities with EPR.

In this research article we explore extended producer responsibility (EPR) programs that cover packaging in their scope across the continent of Africa. We cover South Africa's Section 18 regulations to the National Environmental Management Waste Act and Kenya's Section 13 of the Sustainable Waste Management Act No. 31. We also get insider information from folks at PROs including Fibre Circle and eWASA who serve as PROs for South Africa's EPR scheme.

In this blog we explore the extended producer responsibility (EPR) programs that include packaging in their scope in the continent of South America --- including Brazil, Colombia, Venezeula, Peru, Uruguay, and Chile. We explore how packaging waste is managed, funded, and collected in 6 nations and how to prepare your business for these laws.

In this lesson we will discuss the European Union's Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive (PPWD), a complex set of regulations and guidelines established to manage packaging lifecycle, including design and disposal, across 27 EU nations.

In this article, we give more insight into life cycle assessments (LCA) for packaging and how they can be an effective tool to ensure compliance with extended producer responsibility (EPR) laws for packaging.

In November of last year we covered extended producer responsibility (EPR) bills in the USA that have emerged the past few years, but did you know that Germany has had an extended producer responsibility system for packaging since the early 1990s? Germany has shifted from VerPackV to VerPackG and they have set the model for extended producer responsibility programs that have followed. Germany was not only one of the first countries to implement an extended producer responsibility (EPR) system, they also experimented with 2 different approaches—The German Packaging Ordinance (1991–2019) and The German Packaging Act (2019—Present).