Nigeria will adopt new regulations aimed at curbing plastic pollution in the country, especially plastic packaging, which is the main source of plastic waste.
Developed with the assistance of the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), these regulations will put companies in charge of managing the plastic packaging they produce and use.
The looming regulations are part of the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), a legislative strategy that has been in effect in Europe for thirty years.
EPR laws greatly mitigate waste from plastic packaging in various countries, and Nigerian officials are optimistic about similar results.
“Expanding producer responsibility shifts responsibility for waste management to producers, adopting the polluter payment principle,” said the innocent Barrikel, Director-General of the National Environmental Standards and Regulation Enforcement Agency of Nigeria.
Over the past two decades, Nigeria's waste management systems have been under severe pressure as plastic production and imports upgrade, resulting in widespread environmental pollution.
Under the new EPR framework, companies involved in the production, import, distribution and sale of plastic packaging will provide funding to producer responsibility organizations.
The mission of these nonprofit entities is to reduce packaging pollution, accounting for 63% of the country's plastic waste.
These regulations also require companies to seek alternative packaging solutions, funding recovery plans, simplify recyclability, and include a minimum proportion of recyclable content in the packaging.
Nigeria is currently developing a strategy with UNEP support and is expected to operate in the coming months.
Although some countries have been enacting EPR laws for fifty years, addressing various types of waste, research by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) shows that such regulations can increase recycling rates, reduce municipal burdens, and provide consistent pollution control funding.
For example, since the implementation of the EPR law in the early 1990s, the recycling rate in France has increased significantly.
French producer responsibility group Citeo reports that 67% of household packaging and 27% of plastic are now recycled, far exceeding the global plastic recycling rate of 9%.
While EPR has benefited a lot, experts warn that it should be part of a broader policy approach, including phase-out problematic plastics, promoting reuse, redesigning products, and improving waste management standards.
