What’s next for plastic waste reduction?

We know that packaging is a huge concern for our customers and members, especially the use of plastics. That’s why we are reducing the use of plastic in all of our own-brand packaging where possible, and where it is used, all packaging will be possible to recycle from June 2020, at home or through the collection of plastic film in selected Co-op stores.

What are Co-op doing to reduce plastic waste?

We’re making all our packaging possible to recycle at home or in selected Co-op stores, increasing our use of recycled plastic in packaging and where we can, removing plastic altogether.

Did you know?
Plastic film is thin and flexible packaging, and includes things like the plastic bags that pasta and rice come in, plastic bags around sliced bread, plastic bags used for fruit and vegetables, the plastic film on the top of yogurt pots and ready-meals, and plastic microwave pouches.

What have Co-op already done to reduce plastic waste?

Last summer we launched the first UK supermarket certified compostable carrier bag, removing 60 million plastic carrier bags from Co-op stores, but that was just the latest major innovation in plastic reduction. In 2008, we changed our cotton bud stems from plastic to cardboard (11 years before other UK retailers) and in the past few years, we’ve moved all our Co-op pizzas onto cardboard trays, removing un-recyclable polystyrene trays completely. This alone saved 200 tonnes of un-recyclable every year.

Did you know?
Black and dark coloured plastics aren’t easily detected in the recycling system and end up going to landfill or contaminating recycling bins, so we removed them from all our packaging last year.

How are Co-op going to further reduce plastic waste?

Already this year, we’ve fast-tracked our plans to make all Co-op branded packaging possible to recycle, at home or through collection points in selected Co-op stores, from June 2020.

I’m really excited about completing this to make recycling easier for our customers and members.

Hear our experts share their top tips for living more sustainably in The Big Question episode of the In It Together podcast, brought to you by Co-op.

Iain Ferguson
Environment Manager

Read more about how we’re tackling plastic:

• Co-op packaging and recycling: our story so far
  It’s amazing to see my idea to help tackle plastic waste come to life at Co-op
• We’re banning single‑use plastic carrier bags in over 1,000 Co‑ops