SIBA comments on the Government’s new Resources and Waste Strategy
Commenting on the Resources and Waste Strategy for England, published today, Head of Public Affairs and Communications for SIBA James Calder said;
“This waste and resources strategy is perhaps the most ambitious, and most forward looking document to come from Government in this area in years. Independent brewers want to see the amount of recycled material go up, pollution go down and the costs of new cans and bottles to drop through increased use of recycled materials. But proposed reforms to the PRN (for producer packaging responsibility) could potentially increase costs to small brewers by a factor of 10. A badly designed, confusing or burdensome Deposit Return Scheme could also impact small brewers disproportionately.
James went on to say:
“Small brewers in a highly competitive marketplace working on tight margins will find it very difficult to absorb costs like these. SIBA is working closely with DEFRA to ensure that the financial impact on small brewers is mitigated, whilst working responsibly to ensure that we protect our natural capital. When the vast majority of craft beer is consumed in a licensed premises or in the home (and not on-the-go) existing closed loop recycling for commercial venues and kerbside collections for homes do a great job of collecting empty craft beer cans and bottles already.”
ENDS
For more information please contact james.calder@siba.co.uk or 07934850250
Notes to Editors
- SIBA, the Society of Independent Brewers represents 750 small independent professional breweries and around 80% (by production volume) of independent brewers in the UK.
- SIBA members placed 18.7% of their beer in glass bottles in 2018, around 4.1% in cans and the rest in casks and kegs. The proportion of bottled and canned beer is growing year on year.
- This equates to around 150 million glass bottles of beer and around 35 million aluminium cans placed onto the market by SIBA members in total annually.
- The Waste and Resources Strategy for England, published by DEFRA today can be found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/765625/resources-waste-strategy-dec-2018.pdf
