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Red Deer city council agrees product producers should be responsible for recycling

Producers of packaged goods will have to take on the responsibility for recycling in Alberta as of next April
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(Advocate file photo).

Producers of packaged goods should bear the responsibility for recycling plastics and cardboard, Red Deer city council decided.

Councillors =voted on Tuesday to tentatively allow municipal recycling — blue cart — services to be taken over by producers once the Province of Alberta officially joins most provinces across Canada to adopt the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) policy, which makes the product creators responsible for their end re-use.

Provincial legislation that requires producers of single-use products and hazardous products to provide a common collection system that has recycling targets for their products as of April 1, 2025.

As for what this will mean for regular citizens, the city's waste management superintendent Janet Whitesell said it should mean very little change. It may even lower costs of a recycling program that, under the city, is being run with utility funds.

Under the Extended Producer Responsibility program, citizens will still dispose of their recyclables in their blue carts —  only instead of the city offering a contracted recycling program, it will now be producers who run the program. Furthermore, Whitesell said the producers in other provinces have become more more innovative and have discovered ways to recycle Styrofoam and other products previously thought not to be recyclable.

She added that goods should not cost consumers more in grocery stores because prices are set nation-wide, and most other provinces are already using EPR programs.

On Tuesday, city council unanimously voted to remain registered under the EPR legislation. Administration will prepare a report before the end of the year with details related to cost, benefits and risks of participating as a contracted service provider.