#BackToSender: return bottles and cans to drinks producers

With the campaign #BackToSender, environmental organisation Recycling Netwerk wants to urge beverage producers to support the expansion of deposit systems.

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“As an environmental organisation, we believe that producers themselves bear responsibility for their disposable packaging. They sell 1 million plastic bottles per minute worldwide, but take no care of what happens to them after use. With our campaign, we are asking them to speak out positively in favour of expanding deposit systems. So that their packaging no longer ends up in nature”, explains director Rob Buurman of Recycling Netwerk.

The idea is that Dutch and Flemish people who find an empty beverage container outdoors can easily return it to the producer. This can be done by post (free of charge to the freepost address, or stamped to the postal address) or by taking a photo of the packaging and posting it on social media with the hashtag #BackToSender.

“This way, you can let the beverage producer know that their waste bothers you, and that you are asking for a structural solution”, explains Rob Buurman of Recycling Netwerk. The environmental organisation will also return a beverage container themselves every day and is preparing further actions.

Indeed, more and more people are annoyed by litter. Forty per cent of it consists of empty cans and plastic bottles. Awareness campaigns and clean-up actions are no match for such a flood of waste. The costs for cleaning up are currently skyrocketing. That bill ends up with the municipalities and therefore ultimately with the taxpayers.

A deposit system is the only method proven to reduce plastic bottles in litter by 90 per cent. A deposit system is also a prerequisite for a circular economy and climate policy: it guarantees much more reuse of raw materials and fewer CO2 emissions.

With Anheuser-Busch InBev (producer of Jupiler, among others) and Heineken Holding, Belgium and the Netherlands host the numbers 3 and 5 of beverage producers in the Forbes Global 2000 list respectively. Pepsico is the largest beverage company, Coca-Cola the second.

“In addition to Coca-Cola and Heineken, we also find many cans and bottles of Red Bull and Spa in the litter”, Buurman explains. “If all those companies were to follow Coca-Cola's example in Scotland, and agree to a deposit system, that would be a big step forward for our neighbourhoods and nature. The first mover would also enjoy an image bonus”, Recycling Netwerk concludes.

You can follow the BackToSender campaign on these platforms:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Back_to_Sender

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/back.to.sender/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/backtosend/

Website of Recycling Netwerk: recyclingnetwerk.org