The Yukon government has presented proposed amendments to the Environment Act to help implement the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) system in the territory.
The EPR is a waste management approach in which producers of products and packaging are “legally obligated to ensure those products and packaging are responsibly managed at the end of their life,” according to an Oct. 10 statement.
The statement says this represents a departure from the current waste management approach, which is subsidized by Yukon taxpayers.
While introducing the bill at the Yukon Legislative Assembly on Oct. 12, Environment Minister Nils Clarke said the legislation includes “several small but important amendments to the Environment Act that are necessary to enable the implementation of a fully modern, extended producer responsibility system in the Yukon.”
The proposed amendment followed a survey from Yukon residents which ran from November 2022 to February 2023. The aim of the survey was to gauge public opinion on how an EPR responsibility framework should work, including which products to add in the regulation and feedback on technical definitions.
Natalia Baranova is an environmental protection analyst with the Yukon government. She said the legislation was first amended in 2014 to enable EPR. Since then, work has been underway to introduce regulations.
When asked this month how much money the EPR system is expected to save the government in taxpayers money, Baranova said it’s unclear what the final number will be.
“The actual amount is going to be several millions, but we don’t have an exact number,” she said in an interview with the News. “The EPR is proposing not only to collect printed paper and packaging, it’s also going to collect household hazardous waste and these are the programs that the government pays for every year to collect and get those materials properly managed.”
Yukoners are paying an estimated $2.9 million per year for the EPR services, she said.
Per the Yukon government statement, the proposed amendments to the legislation will ensure the government has the authority to establish an effective producer hierarchy, exempt certain producers from the extended producer responsibility regime and ensure that producers outside the Yukon will be captured under the regulation.
“The producer hierarchy is an integral element of the extended producer responsibility framework, and it recognizes that the entity that has the most control over how product or packages are designed and manufactured is either the brand owner or the manufacturer of the material that the retailer is selling,” Baranova said.
She said an effective producer hierarchy places the responsibility first on the entity that has the most control.
“So we’re looking at a three tier hierarchy where the top tier is the brand owner, they’re the ones that design and decide how each item is packaged or how each item is designed,” she said, going on to explain why some producers might be exempt from the EPR extended regime.
“The reason why you might cascade down through the hierarchy is if you don’t have a Canadian entity or Yukon entity to obligate at a higher rung of the hierarchy,” she said. “But then looking specifically at the exemptions, we are also proposing to exempt small businesses from the obligations and those would be those businesses that place small amounts of printed paper and packaging material onto the market.”
The News asked if the experiences of other jurisdictions in the country were taken into consideration before planning the upcoming amendments in the legislation.
Baranova said officials looked towards British Columbia because “they have the most mature program in Canada, and they’re also literally just across the border from us. So, a lot of elements of our regulation are aligned with B.C, but also, we looked at other jurisdictions and built on it.”
“We have been able to pull elements of different programs across the country into the Yukon to ensure that we have the system that can operate as smoothly across boundaries as is possible with the regulatory limitations that we have,” she said.
Community Services Minister Richard Mostyn said introducing the legislation is an important feature in the territory’s approach to develop a standardized waste management system that is based on a shared responsibility for waste management and waste reduction.
“Financially sustainable, collaborative environmental health and economic benefits will be seen in the territory through this change,” he said.
The amendments to the legislation is expected to be passed in winter and implementing the EPR by 2025 is a commitment of the territorial government.
Baranova said the legislation is currently going through readings and they are looking to finalize it by the end of the calendar year. She noted that this doesn’t mean that amended legislation will go into effect right away as there’s going to be a two-year transition period to allow for the implementation.
“What that period will entail is the producers and producer responsibility organizations will be further consulting with stakeholders, including local businesses, on what the program is going to look like,” she said. “They’re going to submit a program plan called stewardship plan to the government for approval. And once we, as a government, review, and approve this program plan, there’ll be, you know, time for the producers to set up the contracts and work out the logistics to get these programs running on the ground.”
“We’re very happy to be taking these steps to get us to the modern recycling system in the Yukon and not just recycling, but other waste diversion methods as well will be included in there. And that will set us up for the future so that we can adequately manage the waste that we generate in the territory.”
Contact Patrick Egwu at patrick.egwu@yukon-news.com