When the calendar changes 2016 many businesses in Saskatchewan will find themselves having to deal with a new recycling program.
The Household Packaging and Paper Stewardship Program which will launch Jan.1 in Saskatchewan under the Multi-Material Stewardship Western (MMSW) umbrella.
The program is not unique to Saskatchewan, being patterned on existing programs in British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec.
And it won’t be easy on business, or at least not initially, said Allen Langdon, Managing Director, Western Canada with MMSW.
“The first year will be most difficult and onerous,” he told the regular noon luncheon meeting of the Yorkton Chamber of Commerce last Thursday, adding the process will “not be a lot of fun.”
Langdon did add that in year two, three and beyond the process for business should be “much, much easier” as they come to better understand the data they need to collect, and benchmark numbers are established.
While the new program will target household packaging and paper, generally materials consumers take home with them which ultimately are thrown away, it will be the businesses from which the materials come which will be facing new fees for the material to help fund recycling initiatives.
Langdon said in terms of the programs businesses are being termed ‘stewards’.
You are a Steward if your business provides packaging and/or paper to SK residential consumers, he explained.
As a steward a business will be encouraged to reduce the amount of packaging and paper they use, choose recyclable packaging, and make changes to packaging to increase recyclability.
The latter two initiatives by business would reduce the tonnages of paper they would have to pay a recycling levy on.
The new program is not voluntary, although each business will need to look at the details to know if they must participate, as there are exceptions to involvement based on sales, paper volumes and other criteria, note Langdon.
That said a business is obligated to register and make reports. The first step will be to register with MMSW and sign a Membership Agreement. After that businesses will be required to submit annual reports on how many kilograms of packaging and paper the business supplied to Saskatchewan residents. They will then pay a fee on that tonnage, which will vary based on the potential returns from recycling of various products. A fee schedule can be found at www.mmsk.ca/stewards/fees
The program is expected to generate about $8 million annually in the province, said Langdon. Administration costs will take just more than 21 per cent of those finds. The remainder will be distributed to participating municipalities, those having signed on to the program which have recycling programs in place.
Yorkton City Manager Lonnis Kaal said locally they are expecting $87,000 a year, based on a fixed $11.75 per household. That will be $7000 more than the City received from previous programming in 2014.
