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Soft Plastics, Hard Truths with Barry Cosier, Co-CEO, Soft Plastics Stewardship Australia
110 Plays20 days ago
What do we need to address Australia’s soft plastics problem? In this episode, we sit down with Barry Cosier, Co-CEO of Soft Plastics Stewardship Australia to unpack the long road to the ACCC’s draft determination, the rise of new recycling infrastructure, and why standards, traceability, and demand are the missing links. From sausage factories to KitKat wrappers, this conversation pulls apart the myths, the gaps, and the solutions needed to finally close the loop on plastics.
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Transcript
Tracing Ingredients & Plastics for Safety
00:00:00
Speaker
If you ask anyone what's in a sausage, you don't know. They do know because they have to trace it so they can trace what's in a sausage back to the farm. Can you not tell me? Please don't tell me what's in a sausage. i They're delicious, but I don't want to know. how delicious but so So traceability is possible. If you can trace the contents of a sausage back to the farm for food safety,
00:00:25
Speaker
you can trace plastics through a supply chain or glass through a supply
Introduction to 'Loopholes' Podcast
00:00:29
Speaker
chain. so Welcome to Loopholes, a podcast investigating breakdowns and breakthroughs in circular systems and infrastructure. We'll dig into what's broken, what's working, and how we can close the loop for good.
Acknowledging Traditional Custodians & Infrastructure's Role
00:00:44
Speaker
I'm one of your hosts, Justin Frank, Circle Economy and Supply Chain expert, and I'm delighted to introduce my co-host, the best strategic and infrastructure advisor in the business, Kate Dryden from Sphere Infrastructure.
00:00:57
Speaker
Well, here we are again, Justin, back for another tilt at the podcast. Before we get started, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land that we're recording on today.
00:01:10
Speaker
We wish pay our respects to their elders past, present and emerging, acknowledging that infrastructure plays a key part in keeping the soils, air and waterways clear and
Challenges in Soft Plastics Recycling
00:01:21
Speaker
clean.
00:01:21
Speaker
How's your week been? it's been It's been a whirlwind week as ever. it Maggot madness at Go Terra. It's been lots of fun. There's always new things to do and lots of big projects to move forward, but we're getting there. It's a lot of fun.
00:01:35
Speaker
excited about today's chat because soft plastics is something that's so familiar to everyone. i don't think there's anyone who doesn't use it touch a touch of soft plastic, you know, daily.
00:01:49
Speaker
So I think it's going to be quite interesting to just talk about how, um you what the challenges have been in terms of getting recycling of this material up and running in Australia and more globally as
iQ Renew Plant Launch
00:02:04
Speaker
well.
00:02:04
Speaker
Yeah, it's been a momentous couple of weeks in the industry and from an infrastructure perspective, which is what Loopholes is all about, with the infrastructure gap and fixed market problems and draw attention to it.
00:02:16
Speaker
A brand new launch of the iQ Renew soft plastics recycling plant up in Tarria. It's culmination of hard work, grant funding, policy, collaboration, and great to see it and and looking forward to hearing more about it in the podcast.
Sphere Infrastructure's Role in Recycling
00:02:31
Speaker
I couldn't agree more. I mean, since being, we established Sphere Infrastructure Partners in 2018. I remember early conversations with our guest, Barry himself, but other players, you know, i can renew, Lycella, the large waste players all around, how do we get soft play infrastructure happening? And I think that started in like 2020.
00:02:54
Speaker
yeah And so, like at least in my living memory, and so here in 2025, as you say, to see that there's a soft plastic recycling plant actually up and running and operational.
Establishing Recycling Infrastructure
00:03:08
Speaker
yeah Amazing, so exciting, but also such an illustration of how long and how challenging these projects are. Yeah, and and I think APR have got approval or another set approval, another piece of infrastructure down in Melbourne, which will wish you start being commissioned, which, again, is awesome. It's exactly what we want to see, know, those processing gaps being filled.
00:03:30
Speaker
And then just the offtake, the pull demand for recycled products is what we've got to be working I think I, you know, I worked with Barry briefly when it was the Australian Food and Grocery Council's National Plastic Recycling Scheme.
00:03:45
Speaker
And, you know, to see it move into now an extended producer responsibility scheme, so Soft Plastic Stewardship Australia, it just shows how long you do have to work in it.
Barry's Journey in Recycling
00:03:56
Speaker
And I think if we can get that collaboration across federal, state, local government, industry, um brand owners, waste players, then hopefully we can start to expedite that timeline of highlighting a market failure and collaborating across the value chain to fix it.
00:04:13
Speaker
But really, really looking forward to hearing Barry's insights as to the journey that they've been on. Agree.
History of Soft Plastics Recycling
00:04:19
Speaker
Let's get into it. Really good to have you along today, Barry. Thanks for joining us. Probably for those of our audience who aren't familiar with all of the great work that you've done, could you just give us a little bit of potted history of where you've been? You know, as we said in the intro, you've had a really interesting background from working in MRFs the food and beverage industry, but to where we are today talking about the circular economy, can you just give us a little history?
00:04:49
Speaker
Yeah, I've come to circular economy on a very indirect path. So starting work as an accountant, ending up in the food and grocery sector, selling shampoo and toothpaste initially, right through to running a tea company into the waste sector, and now starting a product stewardship entity. So it's certainly not something you'd get on careers day, but very fulfilling.
00:05:15
Speaker
Once you're in waste, you can never leave, Murray, they say, don't they? Exactly. And big news big news on the draft ACCC findings.
00:05:26
Speaker
ah Congratulations, a culmination of years of work. How do you feel about that? Yeah, no, it's a real milestone day for us when we got the draft determination. We're still going to get to the final authorisation, but it was a real, I guess, recognition of all that time and effort, and we spent a lot of time on the due diligence, what is global best practice, and I guess getting the confidence and the support um of the ACCC testament.
00:05:53
Speaker
Maybe just for those who are less familiar with the journey what you've achieved to date, maybe you could just explain that and sort of, I guess, the path forward because I know that a date of the 1st of January has been spoken about. So what does that actually mean?
00:06:11
Speaker
Yeah, I'll talk about little bit history and go to the next steps. This all started probably about five years ago. Red Cycle was up and running. it was serving a great purpose. It was collecting from about 98% of the population, but it only collected 2% of the soft plastics placed on the market.
00:06:29
Speaker
So again, that's that say-do gap. Everyone wanted it collected. The access was there through Coles and Woolworths supermarkets, only getting 2%. So we set about how do you scale that? How do you build?
00:06:42
Speaker
How do you collect more? And that went to you need more recycling capacity. And for more recycling capacity, needed to collect more.
Enhancing Recycling Capabilities
00:06:50
Speaker
So hence, we over the years, we've run curbside trials.
00:06:54
Speaker
A lot of people will have seen the Nestle KitKat trial, where they worked with IQ Renew, developed the curvy bag, collected through the recycling bin network of their local councils,
00:07:08
Speaker
and then recycled the soft plastics through chemical recycling with Lysella, the CAT-HTR plant, back into oil, back into plastic packaging, and back into the KitKat wrapper as trial.
00:07:21
Speaker
So that sort of kicked it off and proved everyone it was real. Since then, red cycles and unfortunately collapsed. The retailers have done an amazing job getting that legacy stockpile all but processed, and we now have the recycling capacity on shore to process materials about two to three times what Red Cycle used to collect.
00:07:42
Speaker
So the next steps for us is get the ACCC authorization, and then as the end markets increase and as the funding from brands increases, we'll increase the collections.
Investment & Government Regulation
00:07:55
Speaker
Woolworths are already at about 500 stores. Coles already had some stores as well. So there's about 50% to 60% access
00:08:05
Speaker
access to soft plastics collections today, but we need to significantly ramp it up. But we won't do that ahead of either end market demand or scheme funding constraints.
00:08:17
Speaker
What would you say, i guess the experience you've had now with soft plastics, what would you say the biggest gaps in how Australia approaches circularity?
00:08:29
Speaker
Yeah, it's certainly not intent or enthusiasm. There's so much of that across all sectors. When I first came into this, into more the advocacy space, there was a lot of finger pointing and a lot of blame.
00:08:42
Speaker
Each sector wanted to blame another sector and everyone wanted to blame government. I think the debate has matured a lot to action and was like, what do we need to move? So I think the biggest issues now are investment certainty.
00:08:55
Speaker
The intents there, the number of calls we have with people who propose a solution is astronomical. but the investment certainty is key.
00:09:06
Speaker
And the other piece is aligned systems across the country. So it's a minimum standards that incorporate from the designer product through collection, through recycling, through reprocessing, right through to demand offtake.
00:09:22
Speaker
If you
Importance of Investment Certainty
00:09:23
Speaker
don't yeah tick all those boxes, you'll end up with ah another scheme. Absolutely. And that's how you get the investment certainty as well, really, isn't it?
00:09:34
Speaker
It is. And yeah, sort of bang on about investment certainty a lot because it's very easy to collect material. There's so much evidence of schemes that have excelled in collection. It's actually the recycling.
00:09:48
Speaker
And to get that investment confidence and so to develop the markets and to not be, I guess, have investments eroded by other, you know, fly-by-nighters, so to speak.
00:10:00
Speaker
you've got to have some minimum standards and some government regulation there to underpin those, and they're very large investments. Yeah, well, you need the offtake and you also need then the pool demand of the recycled product as
Need for Government Regulation
00:10:12
Speaker
well, don't you? Otherwise, you get the collection engines in place, but then no capacity to process it, and then you can process it, but if you don't have that final demand for a product, then it all falls down, doesn't it?
00:10:24
Speaker
Exactly. I referred to the early discussions between the sectors where you'd have You can have brands saying the recycling systems are not the standard. you have the recycling system saying it's packaging design.
00:10:36
Speaker
And then when you tick those two boxes, that's not enough end market demand. And then for demand, we need traceability. yeah Everyone's correct. So you've got to get the whole lot from trying packaging design to be risk fit for purpose, but recyclable.
00:10:52
Speaker
You're going to need a collection network that reaches the majority of people. It's effective and efficient. it doesn't rely on everyone, you know, putting in the boot of their car and becoming a transporter themselves through to minimum standards for recycling facilities and recycling so sortation and recycling.
00:11:12
Speaker
I think the key thing there is if you don't have a minimum standard, you can get, you know, less than reputable operators coming in and undermining good investments.
00:11:23
Speaker
So they'll have ah but of an inferior product, but they're cheaper and price always wins. But then ultimately you need some pull through, you said, Justin. Is that because it's more expensive for the brands to be using the recovered material?
Complexities of a Circular Economy
00:11:37
Speaker
Is it because it's not more expensive but they're worried about quality? Like why do you think it's going to take government regulation?
00:11:46
Speaker
I think it's such a competitive marketplace. If I think of food and groceries at the moment, there's there's a cost-of-living crisis. There's been numerous government inquiries into the price of supermarket products.
00:11:59
Speaker
You're a very brave brand to go out and push your price up. And there's a lot of evidence to show that, they call it the say-do gap. The community wants sustainable products, but if they purchased on sustainable products, the retailers wouldn't have price discounts. They'd have sustainability days.
00:12:20
Speaker
Mm-hmm. So people buy on price. So you've got to make sure you've got that mix right, and therefore you need the level playing field. So I think if – and glass is a good example. When you buy a glass bottle, whatever comes out of the furnace is the recycled content you have.
00:12:37
Speaker
And so it's up to the producer to wind it up and there's no barriers. We've now got to get the same in plastics, where it becomes the norm that there's recycled content in the packaging.
00:12:47
Speaker
Yeah, and
Benefits & Challenges of Plastic Use
00:12:48
Speaker
then that mass adoption brings the price down overall in time, doesn't it? so Exactly. the circular economy gets pitched as the silver bullet, but in reality, it's tough to land.
00:12:59
Speaker
In your view, what are the biggest blockers?
00:13:05
Speaker
So I think definitely government needs have a look at the end-to-end alignment of standards. And the other one would be traceability. So...
00:13:16
Speaker
People will only procure brands or government or community will only procure recycled content if it's proven to be recycled content. So yeah a clear traceability framework is probably the other key unlocker.
00:13:30
Speaker
And is that traceability all the way through to the consumer? Definitely. So i recently had the pleasure of going through a sausage factory, a very large one.
00:13:41
Speaker
Pleasure. Very employed, 1,300 people at this one facility. So a very large food processor. Learned a lot there.
00:13:52
Speaker
But one of the epiphanies for me was if you ask anyone what's in a sausage, you don't know. They do know because they have to trace it. So they can trace what's in a sausage back to the farm.
00:14:05
Speaker
Can you not tell me? Please don't tell me what's in a sausage, JJ. They're delicious, but I don't want to know. How delicious. So traceability is possible. If you can trace the contents of a sausage back to the farm for food safety, you can trace plastics through supply chain or glass through a supply chain. So I learned a lot else there too. Other things of interest is the sausages are cooked in the plastic.
00:14:31
Speaker
And this is one of the benefits of plastic is they have to be able to withstand 200 degrees in an oven and then go into a freezer for export at minus 20 degrees. It's a great product for packaging, but we've now got to make it a great product for recycling.
00:14:46
Speaker
i Like that's quite interesting, the plastic, interface because a lot of people say, why are we even talking about recycling yeah plastic? Shouldn't we just eliminate plastic and be using alternative products?
00:15:01
Speaker
But I think what I'm hearing ah from that example is it's too good a product for many food health and safety reasons and other reasons, and so it can't be fully eliminated, and so we just need to find solutions for it.
00:15:17
Speaker
Yeah, it when you think about it You go to the supermarket, if something's not fresh, you don't buy it. And also it's the health and safety benefits.
00:15:27
Speaker
So if you can keep a product protected from moisture, oxygen, light, your shelf life extends. So in the case of meat, I saw some life cycle data once where the emissions in the plastic wrap versus the emissions embedded in the piece of meat was 980 odd to one.
00:15:48
Speaker
So it's absolutely, and so I'm not pro-plastic, I guess we just need the right packaging for the right product. So it's, you it helps extend the shelf life right through a supply chain.
00:16:00
Speaker
Quite often we hear should ban single-use plastics and my lens on that is, is it single-use for the consumer? Yes, but it may have been in a supply chain for 18 months.
00:16:12
Speaker
So it's actually preserved an item of food right from one country, through a boat, through warehousing and onto to your table, fit for purpose to eat. So is it really single use?
00:16:24
Speaker
Not really. And that's what people don't see in the global supply chains, that plastic and oil packaging has a fundamental role in feeding the nation or the globe with using less resource.
00:16:38
Speaker
So there's less food wastage. So all up, we need it, but we've got to make sure it's mismanaged at the end of its life cycle. in
Design & Collection Systems in Recycling
00:16:46
Speaker
the ocean or in just straight to landfill.
00:16:49
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So you've got that eco design, not having multi-layer, multi-polymers, multi-material packaging. But once you get the right design, then you you can mitigate perverse outcomes, such as an increase in food waste, which has obviously an increase environmental impact when the food breaks down in landfill or soon not to be landfills.
00:17:11
Speaker
yeah But yeah, it's that then collection, operation collection and processing of it in the most efficient and high value order. ah But you need that pool demand in terms of the the offtake market and the purchasing markets, which we spoke about.
00:17:26
Speaker
So
Successful Curbside Collection Trials
00:17:27
Speaker
terms of getting the soft plastics collected from the household, ah so are they using the yellow bin or ah kind of a ah collection engine like RecycleSmart? How far away is that from happening, do you think?
00:17:40
Speaker
Yeah, we're we're taking a very conservative approach with um ah curbside collections. So we've run trials for three years and they've proven successful in that some recent data we've seen just from a community survey is about 97% of participants or non-participants in our trials want their preferences for curbside collection. It's just convenient.
00:18:02
Speaker
yeah You can collect a lot more. The quality is good. We've run the trials and the... through the MRFs, and it seems have very limited impact. You need some more staff, you need some bailers, but it's not leaking into other products.
00:18:16
Speaker
So that's really good. The bags aren't bursting. Earlier this week, FlexCollect in the UK released a report after a three-year trial, very similar findings.
00:18:27
Speaker
So we'll roll that out very progressively, initially with the trial councils. And then, again, that's where you need government support and leadership.
00:18:38
Speaker
because that has to be aligned with the processing capacity um and states implementing curbside standards. So we don't have misalignment between Council A and Council B. Some of that demand and the regulation about mandating local manufacturers to, you've got to purchase this from local manufacturers.
00:19:03
Speaker
Is that a really important component of making this work? That's a real tricky one I think government's grappling with at the moment. So it depends which hat you wear because its plastics is a very global supply chain and a lot of our packaging comes in as finished goods into the country. A lot of it ah packaging comes into the country from Asia and other countries. So we don't have enough infrastructure here and manufacturing in the country to consume what we import.
00:19:36
Speaker
and So we have to allow material back out, but we also need to prioritise local manufacturing. So that is a real dilemma and it's a balance. And it's something I know the Australian Council of Recyclers are working on, so we're putting some money into that because you've got to get the balance right to make sure that there is procurement of recycled content and preferably local if we can find the mechanism to do that.
00:20:04
Speaker
Good stuff. So the a spec plant for IQ Renewed that's just opened in Tari, I think there news the other day about the APR plant down in Melbourne progressing along. So ah you've mentioned both mechanical recycling, but also chemical recycling needs. So that kind of market failure that was there and and why the red cycle collection scheme collapsed seems to be being plugged bit by bit.
Voluntary vs Mandatory Recycling Schemes
00:20:29
Speaker
But it's interesting, the geography and demography of Australia, how um many plants you need in which areas to feed the actual demand. What's your take on that?
00:20:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's very early days, Justin. It's great to have that one plant and it's, as I mentioned, it can collect twice as much as what Red Cycle used to collect, but it's still only a fraction of the materials put on market. We need a lot more infrastructure in the country.
00:20:56
Speaker
APR have their development licence, they're building their plant, so we're hoping that will be operational sort of early next year. yeah So that will give us... Local circular plastics that can go from packaging back to packaging through the APR plant and the IQ Renew plant can make have material that goes circular or goes into other commodities.
00:21:19
Speaker
Geographically, make sure it's cost effective as well as minimising environment environmental impacts from excess transport. Having them located in or between population centres is key.
00:21:33
Speaker
yeah So I think between Sydney and Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, or in those areas is where we're going to see the plants appearing. There is another large one being constructed in Adelaide as well, part of Recycling Plastics Australia.
00:21:49
Speaker
They're underway. So I think we'll see lot on the east coast and the west coast. It'll be the same as other commodities that will have to be transported east for recycling.
00:22:01
Speaker
Why do voluntary schemes work? Why you pushing for it as opposed to waiting for government to make it mandatory? And are you still also pushing for mandatory schemes?
00:22:14
Speaker
Yeah, I've recently spoken with the CEOs of some other voluntary schemes. So Australia has a lot of them. Paintback in the paint area, got seamless, battery stewardship scheme.
00:22:26
Speaker
They got a lot of schemes. i think the reason industry does it is industry... wants to own, they do want to own the problem. When they see that their product is having a negative impact, they do step up.
00:22:38
Speaker
Industry leadership gets you so far, but then there's a critical point when you can't scale beyond that. So i think mandatory is inevitable on some problematic materials.
00:22:51
Speaker
We would welcome it because the funding inflows would really accelerate what we do. But I think it's the right way. I think industry knows their products, they know the supply chains, they can kick them off, build the ground, get the support.
00:23:06
Speaker
And then if it needs a nudge, that's when government comes in and regulates the right part of the supply chain. Because every supply chain is different. Some will have a processing issue, some will have a collection issue, some will have a design issue or a combination. So I think that's where government can come in and go okay, well, industry solved this bit.
00:23:25
Speaker
What can we step into now? Yeah, because i mean, extended producer responsibilities is critical. You've got over 500,000 tons of soft plastics in in in the Australian market, and you've only got a small percentage of some of the larger, more sustainably oriented brand owners on board.
00:23:45
Speaker
You've got quite a few free riders in in the market at the moment until it does get mandated. Now, maybe the timing of infrastructure being built is not a bad thing there, but it doesn't quite seem fair that the few are holding up the tail of many users of soft plastics.
Collaboration for Recycling Standards
00:24:03
Speaker
Our members are very well aware of that.
00:24:05
Speaker
i I think our very first supporter was PepsiCo back in 2020. I think they were the first one to sign up. Nestle was putting money in, even before we started, Nestle put money into the trial.
00:24:20
Speaker
Since then, we've got Kellogg's, Unicharm, Ferrero, Mars. don't want to leave them all out, but there's 40 of them. They're big companies, Audi, Coles, Woolies, McCain, Procter & Gamble, Chobani. They're all in.
00:24:34
Speaker
But you add all those up, it's still 15%, only 15% of what's only contribute to of what's placed on market. So we've got 85% other brands and it's other sectors. You go buy a fridge, it's wrapped in soft plastics.
00:24:51
Speaker
You can go to a hardware, you can go to a chemist, you can go to an auto store. It's just such a versatile product to make sure the product receives in your home in perfect condition. So we're hoping we build the scheme.
00:25:05
Speaker
People see that it's working. It's not going to suffer the same demise as RedCycle. They get the confidence to join. But ultimately, to get everyone in will lower the cost to the community because it's spread further and we can achieve more.
00:25:21
Speaker
um And what levers you think government can pull to give businesses more confidence to invest in that infrastructure and collection? Yeah, I think we were talking to a prospective recycler the other day.
00:25:34
Speaker
Mandating scheme participation gives them a lot of confidence because they know they have a certain contractual funding flow So that's probably the first one. In the space of soft plastics, red cycle peaked at 8,000 tonnes.
00:25:51
Speaker
we've We can IQ re-process that much. So we need kerbside collection or other collection methods as well. So I think government indicating that that will be mandated by a certain time period will give people the investment confidence.
00:26:07
Speaker
And as you've rightly pointed out, Justin, it's end market demand. So if there's a recycled content target across numerous categories, I think is fair in sectors, it's very hard to put recycled content back into food grade packaging.
00:26:23
Speaker
If you get it wrong, you can risk kill people or causing health issues. ah You've got to make sure that those standards aren't lowered. So I think recycled content targets into construction, government procurement and other ah sectors It's low-hanging fruit, and I think that's where the government should start.
00:26:44
Speaker
Good stuff. How important do you think that grant funding is to start plugging these infrastructure gaps, which is what Loopholes is all about, is the infrastructure gaps all around different waste streams from food waste to soft plastics to you name it?
00:27:00
Speaker
Yeah, it's definitely key. um like Without that, I don't think a lot of them would get off the ground, so i think it's critical. but it doesn't replace the need for the system standards because you can still build a plant.
00:27:13
Speaker
Okay, if you get a government grant, it's less out of your pocket, but if you don't have the feedstock, it's going to shut down.
Role of Grant Funding
00:27:19
Speaker
And if you don't have the end markets, it's going to shut down. The other piece I think would be beneficial, the the Recycling Modernization Grant.
00:27:27
Speaker
I think it's about $60 million set aside for it. Some should go, it's been going mainly to end market recyclers. But some of that probably should go to councils to help with collection setup costs or to MRFs if they have to make modifications. So which part of the supply chain needs the investment and make sure it goes there because there's no use building 300,000 tonnes worth of recycling capacity if you can only collect 100 tonnes.
00:27:55
Speaker
yeah So you've got to look across the whole supply chain and and plan it and fund it.
Rapid Fire on Circular Economy Policies
00:28:02
Speaker
I reckon it's time for our rapid fire. rapid fire ah Your Prime Minister for a day what circular policy do you fast track?
00:28:12
Speaker
Oh, there could be lots there. Does it have to be around circular economy or can I give myself a tax cut? No, you can't get a tax cut. Okay, can't get a tax cut. mean, that's day two, but day one it has to be a circular policy.
00:28:24
Speaker
Okay, it'd definitely be recycling system standards, get continuity across the supply chain, build that confidence. Design to demand, that's where I'd start. Good stuff. Biggest barrier to a truly secure economy?
00:28:40
Speaker
So I think policy misalignment is probably key. If you could redesign one everyday product to make it waste-free, what would it be? Probably batteries.
00:28:53
Speaker
i know there's a lot of issues around MRF fires and everything. And as an economy, we're moving to electrical power. So that's only, we're going to be reliant on batteries more and more. So I think if we can make batteries more recyclable, definitely.
00:29:09
Speaker
What's the low-hanging fruit in soft plastics that we could fix right now with a bit of political will?
00:29:18
Speaker
We've got the scheme. We've got the will. We just need scheme participation. So scheme participation, that combined with me being Prime Minister in Recycling Standards and we ticked everything.
00:29:30
Speaker
Good stuff. And then you put your marketing hat on and yeah you've got a billboard, you've got access to that one that's over the Glebe Island Bridge as you're going over you know over the Anzac Bridge, that massive, what's one message you'd put on it about plastics?
00:29:47
Speaker
I think I'd like to add to the, you know, do the right thing, please don't let it. Put a bit more fact behind it, like, What's an inconvenient truth is plastics reduce emissions, plastics reduce food waste, and plastics increase food safety.
00:30:02
Speaker
So don't litter. It's valuable. It's a long billboard, I know. It is. I mean, at least it is. ah You probably would be picked up by the marketing people to make it shorter, but I understand what you're getting at.
00:30:16
Speaker
This topic of soft plastics is a really interesting one because people have followed, you know, householders, have followed this journey. They don't necessarily understand everything
Reflection & Industry Challenges
00:30:28
Speaker
that's behind us. Like, why is it so hard?
00:30:30
Speaker
Once upon a time, I could put my soft plastics into a bin at Woolies and then I couldn't. And now I can in some stores and not in others. And so i I think you've really helped to sort of unpack that mystery for those who aren't in the know. And then for those who are in the know and follow this journey. journey of circular infrastructure and all the trials and tribulations along the way. i think many of the things you speak about are not just ah true for soft plastics, it's true for all types of waste and resources. So thanks for all those insights.
00:31:04
Speaker
Yeah, and Barry, massive congratulations. if there was ah an award for resilience, um yeah you'd definitely be yeah nominated for it. it's It's been a long time coming to get to this juncture. So the staying power and the focus to to keep pushing it forward and to keep trying to find the angles to collaborate ah with without with the barriers or the naysayers, I think it's really commendable. So congratulations and well done.
00:31:29
Speaker
All right, time to wrap it up. Wrap it up like a sausage in a sausage factory. How many, I'm going to start counting how many sausage factory quotes you're going to refer to.
00:31:42
Speaker
Well, it was it was Barry that brought up his epiphany in a sausage factory, the traceability of the sausage all the way through, but the fact that the soft plastics are are actually cooked in the soft plastics and how it actually extends the shelf life.
00:31:55
Speaker
it's ah It's a really interesting point around the importance of packaging to prevent perverse outcomes of increased food waste associated ah methane emissions or CO2 equivalent emissions that come from that.
00:32:07
Speaker
it's not all evil. You just need the collection systems and the infrastructure in place to process it and recycle it to turn it back into either food grade packaging or paving stones or bricks.
Future of Recycling & Digital Infrastructure
00:32:18
Speaker
A really fascinating talk, I thought. What did you think? Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, we'd love that there is a world where we don't need soft plastic, but actually the conversation really highlighted, as you said, but through the epiphany of the sausage factory, that there is always going to be a need for soft plastic. So with that reality, but we know putting that lens on it, then having um solid solutions to recycle the material as opposed to it just going to landfill like it
00:32:50
Speaker
mostly currently does is so very important. And I thought that that point was so yeah really well made. Yeah, I mean, his comments around the LCA of emissions, around the plastic wrap versus the embedded ah emissions in a piece of meat was 980 to 1. mean, that is massive. So it does show what an important role packaging can play. But the the eco-design piece is absolutely critical. So you don't get contamination into the the waste streams and then it's easier to sort separate. So those collection engines can work effectively and improve the processing through that. So
00:33:26
Speaker
the The soft plastics example is is a fantastic example of market failure. ah The red cycle collapse ah led to a lot of consumer outrage and it brought both retail and industry and government into the crosshairs.
00:33:39
Speaker
But I think the way that what was the Australian Food and Grocery Council that turned into National police Plastics Recycling Scheme and now the Soft Plastics Stewardship Association, slow is smooth, smooth is fast. It's taken a long time to get there, but industry stepping up to try and solve the problem. Yeah.
00:33:56
Speaker
It seems really refreshing, but obviously still need support from multiple layers of government, from federal for policy and local or state government to reinvest at the landfill levies into infrastructure and education, and then the local government to spend those funds on education and and getting it moving.
00:34:14
Speaker
It's a complicated layer cake. And then, of course, there's the other tricky element of how do you get this, you know, once you do have the treatment facilities, you have the pool.
00:34:26
Speaker
to make sure that the material that then is being used to cover the sausages or whatever is actually you know from recovered material itself.
00:34:37
Speaker
And he spoke about the reality of there being overseas source material as well as local and how that adds, you know I guess, a tricky dimension.
00:34:48
Speaker
But we can't have a true circular economy until we really solve that piece as well and that comes into the design of this material in the first place so yeah yeah it was a good it was i think a good discussion of all the different parts of the process that needs to be working to make it all come together ah Yeah, absolutely. It shows what can happen where you have a missing link in the chain. So that kind of processing infrastructure miss was how the whole Redcycle, you know, debacle came about. But now you've got the spec plant from IQ Renew up and running, which is very exciting piece of infrastructure for the industry.
00:35:26
Speaker
i think API down in Melbourne have just announced some yeah developments there. So the infrastructure is coming, which is a fantastic thing to see to fix this. And the fact that we do have an oil refiner on site,
00:35:38
Speaker
or on site in the country, and shows that you can go fully circular back to great packaging or even as a sustainable aviation fuel. The circularity is there and we're quite lucky in that respect to be an island that has that. And now we have the processing capacity building It's, as you rightly say, the off-take market for the commodity that's produced, whether it's a flake or a pellet, having the collection engines either return to store, which looks like it's the the first priority, but also having those collection engines at curbside and finding the solutions to get
00:36:13
Speaker
round some of the challenges that some of the MRFs might have. It sounds like a lot of testing there and and a lot of international exploration in New Zealand and England as well. Yep. But the opportunities for the collection channels like the Recycle Smarts of the World to collect from the household and, again, that really clean stream source operation.
00:36:33
Speaker
Yep. No, absolutely. And, you know, ah the the shout-out to all of the different ah companies that have sort of despite the um or in the absence of some of the government assistance that he was, I guess, asking for, but nonetheless have really invested funds and time and people and effort. That was, yeah, like a could ah good news story, but I guess i won't keep doing it forever if there's not that government support.
00:37:07
Speaker
All right. So what's next? What's next indeed? Well, we've got another really fascinating guest. I mean, she is part of this fascinating picture, of Katie Barfield from Yumi Foods. And I think hearing about the digital piece and and indeed the AI link to infrastructure and plugging that infrastructure gap, I'm really looking forward to that conversation.
00:37:37
Speaker
Yeah, me too. Digital infrastructure to push us further up the waste hierarchy to avoidance and reduction in waste is a a critical part of solving this very complex problem. So can't wait to get involved into that one. and All right, take care. I look forward to speaking to you next time.
00:37:54
Speaker
Definitely. See you soon.