FACtsheet– Other product stewardship arrangements
MobileMuster
MobileMuster is the recycling program of the Australian Mobile Telecommunications Association (AMTA), the peak body representing Australia’s mobile telecommunications industry. It is the only electronic product recycling program led by the whole of industry in the world. It is funded voluntarily by its members, including handset manufacturers, battery distributors and mobile phone network service providers. These organisations pay an advance recycling levy, raising 42 cents for every handset they import into Australia. A small recycling rebate is also received, offsetting around 3 per centof the program's costs.
MobileMuster was initiated by the AMTA in 1999 to collect and recycle mobile phone handsets, batteries and accessories from a network of over 4500 mobile phone retailers, local councils, government agencies and business drop-off points across Australia. The recycling service is free to consumers, schools, businesses, local councils and government agencies. AMTA reports annually on the program.
The 2011–12 annual report noted that 117 tonnes of mobile phone components were collected for the year, up 11 tonnes on the previous year, including more than 847 000 handsets and batteries and 67 874 kg of accessories. This represents a collection rate of just over 51 per cent of mobile phones available for recycling.
Figure 1: Total annual collections by weight (kg) – all mobile phone components[1]
Figure 2: Total number of handsets and batteries collected[2]
drumMUSTER and ChemClear
drumMUSTER and ChemClear are voluntary programs of AgStewardship Australia Limited. They are funded by levies collected by AgStewardship, which was established to develop stewardship programs for Australia’s agriculture sector. AgStewardship contracts Agsafe Ltd to deliver the drumMUSTER and ChemClear programs on its behalf.
drumMUSTER is the national program for the collection and recycling of eligible nonreturnable crop production and animal health product chemical containers. Eligible containers are those from manufacturers participating in the Industry Waste Reduction Scheme. The first drumMUSTER collection was held at Gunnedah in May 1999. As of May 2013, the program has reported the collection of more than 21 million agricultural and veterinary chemical drums for recycling purposes.[3]
ChemClear is a chemical collection and disposal service for unwanted and unknown agricultural and veterinary chemicals. The appropriate collection and disposal of these chemicals minimises their impact on the environment, if otherwise left unattended. This service ensures that these possible environmental contaminants are retrieved and in turn reduces waste and the possibility of residual contamination. The ChemClear program was launched nationally in 2003 and has since collected over 341 tonnes of obsolete agricultural and veterinary chemicals from regional and local communities across Australia.[4]
Cartridges for Planet Ark
In 2003, Planet Ark, Close the Loop® and participating manufacturers set up the innovative ‘Cartridges 4 Planet Ark’ program, under which cartridges are collected and returned for remanufacturing and recycling, therefore reducing disposal to landfill. A number of manufacturers including Brother, Canon, Epson, HP, Konica Minolta and Kyocera, recyclers Close the Loop® and retail collection outlets including Australia Post, OfficeWorks, DickSmith, JB Hi-Fi, The Good Guys and Harvey Norman share responsibility for the product at end-of-life.
The program is free, convenient, independently audited and coordinated through a network of over 30000 locations nationwide and is one of the most successful voluntary extended producer responsibility programs of its type in the world.
During the 2011–12 financial year, over 3 million cartridges were collected for recycling; up from 2.9 million cartridges the year before.[5]
In 10 years, 'Cartridges 4 Planet Ark' has collected and recycled over 21 million printer cartridges including 9800 tonnes of plastics, metals, inks and toners. The current aim is to recycle 23 million printer cartridges before the end of March 2014 which will coincide with the end of the programs eleventh year.[6]
Australian Packaging Covenant
The Australian Packaging Covenant is an agreement between companies in the supply chain and all levels of government to reduce the environmental impacts of consumer packaging by encouraging improvements in packaging design, higher recycling rates and better end-of-life stewardship of packaging.[7]
The Covenant commenced in 1999 as the National Packaging Covenant and was renewed in 2005. In 2010 it was renamed the Australian Packaging Covenant following agreement by all environment ministers through the Environment Protection and Heritage Council to support a strengthened Covenant. The updated Covenant has a greater focus on sustainable packaging design, workplace recycling, public place recycling, and litter reduction projects.
The Covenant is the voluntary component of a co-regulatory arrangement that is underpinned by the National Environment Protection (Used Packaging) Measure (NEPM) under the National Environment Protection Council Act 1994. Those liable companies who choose not to participate in the Covenant are subject to the conditions of the NEPM.
The Covenant aims to ensure that all involved in the packaging supply chain play their part in reducing packaging waste and assists in leveraging private investment to address packaging waste and litter issues. Since 2005, it has provided $30.6 million to 141 projects with a total value of $126.1 million. Recent projects include the establishment of a film washing plant to process food contaminated flexible plastic packaging, establishing and upgrading away from home recycling facilities, and an educational program to encourage better litter disposal and recycling behaviour at sports venues.
1
[1]MobileMuster, 2013, 2011-12 Annual Report,
[2] Ibid
[3]Drummuster data:
[4]ChemClear data:
[5] Planet Ark, 2013 2011-12 Planet Ark Annual Review, and 2010-11 Planet Ark Annual Review,
[6] Planet Ark, Cartridges for Planet Ark, Current Target - 23 Million Cartridges by March 2014
[7] - Accessed 18 April 2013.