Sustainable FMCG: towards Extended Producer Responsibility

Fifth day of Circular Week 2024 is dedicated to extended producer responsibiliy - european and national legislations, solutions, retailer & producer perspective. We invite you to attend the expert roundtable, to discuss together challenges and solutions for EPR in different industries.

AGENDA:

8:30 – 9:00 – Registration and coffee

9:00 – 9:10 – Welcome by the Ambassador of the Netherlands in Poland, Jennes de Mol

9:10 – 9:25 – EPR: A Comprehensive Overview of the European Context – presentation

• Anna Sapota, Vice President Public Affairs Eastern Europe North, TOMRA

  
  

9:25 – 9.45 – Status of EPR in the Netherlands – presentation

• Femke den Hartog, Public Affairs officer on corporate social responsibility, INretail.

9:45 – 11:00 – Panel discussion I: EPR in production phase (including eco design, digital product passport)

Moderation: Agnieszka Sznyk PhD, INNOWO

• Femke den Hartog, INretail, Public Affairs officer on corporate social responsibility,

• Karolina Mulhern, ESG Manager, VIVE Group.

• Łukasz Sosnowski, President of ProKarton Foundation,

• Bogdan Ślęk, Public & Government Affairs Director CEE, Signify,

• Sebastian Tołwiński, Corporate Affairs & Communications Director, Central and Southeastern Europe, FLORA FOOD GROUP.

11:00 – 11:15 – Coffee break

11:15 – 11.30 Refurbishing – Polish consumers towards the practice of product refurbishment – presentation

• dr hab. Katarzyna Stasiuk, prof. Jagiellonian University,

About: Katarzyna Stasiuk - PhD in psychology, associate professor at the Institute of Applied Psychology at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. She specialises in the psychology of consumer behaviour, with a focus on sustainable consumption. Her research examines consumer attitudes towards refurbishment and upcycling. She is involved in the implementation of Polish (NCN) and international grants (EIT Food) related to consumer behaviour in sustainable food consumption. A member of the Polish Association of Social Psychology and the Sustainable Consumption Research and Action Initiative, she has extensive practical experience in conducting qualitative and quantitative market research.

11:30 – 12:45 - Panel discussion II: EPR in retail and after sale phase (repair, deposit system, “waste” collection)

Moderation: Marzena Cypryanska-Nezlek, Uniwersytet SWPS

• Magdalena Brzezińska, Director Corporate Affairs, Grupa Żywiec (Heineken),

• Michał Mikołajczyk, Director of Sales and External Relations, Rekopol,

• Marta Słomkowska, Digital Marketing Specialist, Device Europe,

• dr hab. Katarzyna Stasiuk, prof. Jagiellonian University,

• Wouter Winters, Enterprise Account Manager, Commvault, Founder Pidzh, Sustainability Director,

• Paweł Wróblewski, Business Development Director Poland, Envipco Holding N.V.

12:45 – 13:00 – O&A session

13:00 – 14:00 – Networking Lunch

ABOUT:

• Device Europe is a Dutch-Polish production facility in Bydgoszcz with the purpose is to revolutionize IT Asset Disposition (ITAD) by delivering secure, sustainable, and cost-effective solutions that enable businesses to responsibly manage their technology assets. The company is committed to safeguarding data, minimizing electronic waste, and helping clients achieve their environmental and operational goals. Through expertise, innovation, and dedication, they strive to be the trusted partner that empowers organizations to embrace the future with confidence.

• Envipco, with its headquarters in the Netherlands, is a leading company in reverse vending machine technology, with over four decades of experience in providing tailored recycling solutions for enterprises of all sizes, from small businesses to large corporations.

• FLORA FOOD GROUP’s purpose drives its targets on climate action, ensuring that its business, products, and packaging are more sustainable. The products are already demonstrably better for the planet than their dairy counterparts. The company is committed to further reducing its environmental impact by sourcing ingredients and creating plant-based products with as minimal a climate footprint as possible. All interventions and actions are backed by the latest science and thinking on environmental impact.

• Grupa Żywiec aims to achieve net zero emissions in production by 2030 and to be carbon neutral across its entire value chain by 2040. The company focuses on three key environmental areas: greenhouse gas emissions, water conservation, and maximizing circularity. In the area of the circular economy, Grupa Żywiec strives for 100% of its packaging to be either reusable or recyclable. The company also aims to reduce the amount of plastic used in bulk packaging, and where plastic cannot be eliminated, it plans to replace it with rPET.

• InRetail is a trade association in the Netherlands representing entrepreneurs in the home and interior, fashion, shoes and sporting sectors, with over 7000 members and more than 17,000 business locations. It is the largest organisation of its kind in non-food retail, covering a sector with a turnover of 25 billion and 150,000 employees.

• PIDZH is a Dutch company with the mission to make sustainability more accessible to everyone on the planet and to establish sustainability as the new normal. The organization is committed to accelerating progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). PIDZH provides practical solutions for each goal by connecting with entrepreneurs who actively support these initiatives. Whether you're a consumer or a company, PIDZH helps you contribute to a more sustainable society and achieve the 17 SDGs.

• ProKarton Foundation raises awareness among Poles about the production process, properties, and benefits of beverage cartons, as well as the importance of sorting the waste generated from them. The organization also works to highlight how beverage cartons align with the concept of a sustainable circular economy.

• Rekopol was established by leading Polish and international companies to safeguard and represent the interests of producers and importers of packaged products, in response to the legal responsibility (under the Act of June 13, 2013, on Packaging and Packaging Waste Management) imposed on businesses for the financial responsibility of the recovery and recycling of packaging from products introduced to the market. Currently, over 2,000 companies collaborate with the organization, aligning with the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) strategy.

• Signify, a global leader in lighting, provides energy-efficient products, systems, and services to businesses, cities, and consumers, helping reduce global electricity consumption in the lighting sector. Sustainable lighting means designing lighting products that are energy-efficient, easy to service, and upgradeable. The company uses recyclable materials and is phasing out most plastic packaging for consumer products.

• TOMRA was founded on an innovation in 1972 that began with the design, manufacturing and sale of reverse vending machines (RVMs) for automated collection of used beverage containers. Today TOMRA provides technology-led solutions that enable the circular economy with advanced collection and sorting systems that optimize resource recovery and minimize waste in the food, recycling and mining industries.

• VIVE Group specializes in textile recycling, wholesale and retail sales of sorted and unsorted second-hand clothing imported from Western European countries, as well as raw material processed into industrial cleaning cloths. During the multi-stage production process, raw material that does not meet customer requirements is discarded or turned into industrial cleaning cloth to be reused. Currently, in line with the assumptions of the VIVE Textile Recycling program "Together We Care for the Environment," the company is working on the possibility of 100% processing of the raw materials entering the plant.