MANILA, Philippines — Two years after the government rolled out one of the most ambitious laws on Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) that hold manufacturers accountable for the waste they produce, a case study conducted by PCX Solutions is showing promising results that could eventually lessen the amount of plastic trash that due to disposal problems result in environmental hazards.

Focusing on the impact of plastic waste that trigger adverse effects on marine wildlife, cause flooding, make groundwater toxic and leading to serious health impacts, That EPR Act, which lapsed into law in 2023, requires companies with at least one hundred million pesos in assets to take responsibility for an increasing percentage of their plastic footprint, rising from 20 percent in 2023 to 80 percent by 2028.

The PCX study result showed that the Filipino people, economy and environment have been heavily hit by the escalating plastic pollution crisis. The Philippines, which is made up of thousands of islands with a limited and fragmented waste management infrastructure, is one of the world’s largest contributors of marine plastic litter.

This is made worse by the prevailing ‘sachet economy’, where brands deliver goods in small units that are affordable for the majority of the population.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources Environmental Management Bureau (DENR-EMB) estimates that 2,130 businesses fall into the current Obliged Enterprise scope and as of August 2024, a total of 947 companies have been registered in the EPR program. Together, those companies enabled the recovery and diversion of 163,000 metric tons of post-consumer plastic packaging waste in 2023.

While not all Obliged Enterprises complied in the first year, continued education efforts aimed at raising awareness and compliance levels are ongoing.

Companies that don’t comply also face escalating fines, and ultimately the loss of their business license for repeated offenses. The majority of the largest plastic packaging producers have complied and many went beyond the minimum 20 percent recovery target for 2023, indicating strong support among the country’s largest Obliged Enterprises.