There have recently been some high profile discussions about waste crimes and non-compliance with duty of care. These discussions have highlighted that, for waste materials to be traceable throughout the supply chain and until their end of life, the information held by producers, managers, brokers and processors of waste must be correct at all stages of the supply chain.

While a number of waste streams such as packaging, end-of-life vehicles, waste electrical and electronic equipment, batteries, tyres etc. are under producer responsibility regulations with the appropriate audit requirements, most waste flows are only covered by the 25 year old duty of care obligation. This self-policing waste registration and tracking system was introduced in 1990 to fight crime and safeguard the environment, as well as to ensure appropriate parties provide the evidence base to show compliance with applicable regulations, including waste hierarchy principles.

Every year, the UK produces over 25 million waste transfer and information notes, many of which are not worth the paper they are written on due to insufficient detail. It’s estimated that over 50% of waste transfer notes are incorrect, meaning waste producers in particular need to ensure their waste streams are going to reputable facilities, with adequate permits, where their waste will be managed as expected, and isn’t just being stored long term in lagoons on farms, or ending up as landfill...

Even the introduction of the electronic duty of care system, ‘edoc’, in 2014 seems to have made little change in improving the traceability of waste and materials. To improve matters, Defra published new statutory guidance for duty of care in March; however, this provides no change in legal requirements and is only supportive of the ‘tackling waste crime’ initiative produced by the Environment Agency and HMRC. Additional funding will be made available by the HMRC over the next five years to increase compliance within the waste supply chain and enable better tackling of waste crime.

It is questionable whether legal compliance with waste management regulations and a ‘tick in the box’ on waste hierarchy considerations is sufficient for the 21^st century and adequate for forward thinking waste producers with their own sustainability and CSR targets to meet.

Many businesses pass their responsibilities through to waste management companies and feel this is where their own liability ends. However, this is is not correct and they need to be aware of their own waste hierarchy obligation, including export of wastes for recycling and recovery. Recent examples in the press, and consistent prosecutions of waste management companies, show that passing responsibilities to waste management partners is not always sufficient to ensure materials are being recycled – waste crimes may still be directly attributable to their producers.

While today the self-policing duty of care system only monitors compliance and waste hierarchy considerations, there are discussions to introduce enforcement in future years. This enforcement would make sure waste hierarchy and resource efficiency is being implemented and circular economy business models are being introduced to meet corporate, national and European targets and aspirations. Could it be that we need an action comparable to the Modern Slavery Act to ‘force’ waste producers to look at their waste supply chain and apply a philosophy of ‘custodianship’ to their waste and our resources?

Anthesis believes that a more responsible and open-minded reporting system from waste producers and waste managers – as part of an embedded sustainability strategy in all operational functions – will provide a solution. Producers need to become custodians of their waste resources, which means having regular and full audit reviews of their material flows through their operations, including the waste supply chain, to identify and utilise opportunities for saving resources, increasing sustainability and meeting CSR commitments.

Regular six or twelve monthly reviews of performance, and requesting your waste contractor to provide competent evidence on how waste streams are being managed, are both necessary checks any business should be carrying out. Have you done a site visit to see where the material is being processed? What is their understanding of how their own sub-contractors are managing individual products and material streams?

Auditing up and down the waste supply chain is, in fact, a legal compliance under existing duty of care regulations for all producers; hence, it makes sense to create, and have available, a full set of material and waste flow information as part of the audit process to identify opportunities for cost savings and improved recycling performance.

It is time for all waste producers and managers to look at the fundamentals of their waste management practices. This starts with ensuring legal compliance through regular, enhanced waste flow audits, and then use the relevant information to identify potential cost reductions by adapting better practice in waste that is fit for the 21^st century. Anthesis has developed an approach to implement the waste custody chain reporting philosophy and provide a transparent approach to ensure sustainability and commercial performance go hand in hand.

For more advice and information, please get in touch with a member of our team: