Advocating Reuse Policy for Circularity and Capacity BuildingChampioning the Circular Economy for a Sustainable Environment and an Equitable Society
Strategic Plan FY 2024
Strategic Action Items
All of our activities are led by data. We measure the social, environmental and economic benefits of the charitable second-hand economy and our members’ contributions to it in order to build a clear business case for ongoing governmental and community support.
Strategic Action Items
We encourage all levels of government to promote reuse, fund recycling innovation and reduce charitable costs in order to improve circular economy outcomes for our members which, ultimately, increases their social and environmental impact.
Reuse Policy Development (see Appendix)
State Government Waste Levy Protection
Strategic Action Items
We help our members do what they do, better, by providing resources, tools and advice on becoming more innovative and progressive reusers, recyclers and retailers. This, in turn, empowers them to become key drivers and accelerators of the circular economy.
Membership Development
Board Matters
Capacity Building and Member Services
Strategic Action Items
We educate and inspire Australians to choose reuse as a simple, cost effective way by which they can purchase quality items while also reducing their environmental footprint and enabling social good in their community.
Reuse Policy Strategy Explained
Charitable Recycling Australia’s key policy objective is to get Reuse integrated into Australian government policies, to embody the Waste Hierarchy into full practice, and to fast-track the transition to a Circular Economy.
Reuse sits at the top of the Waste Hierarchy as a highest and best use intervention and yet it is unsupported by Australian government waste policies. An independent gap analysis of Australian government policies through the lens of the Waste Hierarchy and Circular Economy principles demonstrates the current limited focus on the bottom of the hierarchy like Recycle and Recover.
More importantly, it also identifies opportunities for Reuse to accelerate existing government targets and their ambitions for circular economy transitions.
Paying lip service to the Waste Hierarchy undermines its efficacy. We all know the Waste Hierarchy establishes agreed priorities based on sustainability to reduce and manage waste, and that waste cannot be solved with end-of-life technologies alone. But the hierarchy is useless if it’s not used. Australia needs to stop resisting an integrated approach and start embedding highest and best use interventions like reuse and repair into policy.
It could be argued that reuse was too difficult to measure to be translated into policy targets for the past 140 years where the charitable sector has been operating to circular economy principles since the first charity shop was launched in Australia in the 1880s – sparking reuse to extend the life of everyday household products in what then may have been the first product stewardship scheme.
Today, following ground-breaking research from Monash University, we can effectively measure reuse and articulate its triple bottom line benefits, through the National Reuse Measurement Guidelines, which provide a comprehensive methodology to measure reuse (through POS) and quantify its environmental, economic and social benefits.
In the Monash University approach, reuse will be measured at the point of sale, which captures information about the quantity of items resold, the category of items, and their cost – and allows for the interpretation of data into average weights per category, average material composition and product life cycle assessments that are readily available.
Using this data and other reporting as outlined in the framework, it is now possible
to demonstrate the social, environmental and economic impacts of reuse, including:
This is relevant for all Australian governments as it allows reuse to be integrated into their Circular Economy policies as a highest and best use intervention on the Waste Hierarchy.
Charitable Recycling Australia also developed a bespoke upgrade of the Waste Hierarchy, re-naming it the Resource & Waste Hierarchy to prioritise the resource use phases of highest and best use, over the waste phases.
With these new resources, Australia is now in a position to start walking the talk on the Waste Hierarchy and step up as a global leader in the Circular Economy.
Charitable Recycling Australia’s strategy to influence policy change, is to articulate an irrefutable, data and evidence business case on why reuse is critical to governments and the circular economy.
To do that with integrity, we also need to articulate a case for Highest & Best Use in principle so that all of the higher order interventions are prioritised in order.
In line with this, Charitable Recycling Australia is also partnering with a cross-sector group of highest and best use organisations to advocate collectively for all higher order interventions including First Use, Reuse and Repair.
The strategy in practice is to meet with each of the Australian governments, identify their key needs and Circular Economy ambitions, and to develop a shared vision of how to collectively create a Circular Economy by 2030. It also necessitates a solution-based approach with cross-sector recommendations on what the required interventions may be, as well as their impact – and then move to economic modelling and/or a cost-benefit analysis to inform the next steps.
What has proved helpful in the meetings to date with Australian governments are: