According to Packaging Council of Australia (PCA) CEO Gavin Williams, the effectiveness of the Council is largely due to the quality and dedication of its employees Jen Salem, Tina Okey, Prudence Scholtes and Jessica Brodie.
“Our team has done an outstanding job over many years," Williams says. “The professionalism of the services offered by the PCA is a real credit to the staff.
"They have worked tirelessly to provide a service which has dramatically improved the position of the packaging industry as a key player in public debates and discussions with governments about the fundamental policy issues confronting all companies in the packaging supply chain.”
The aim of the PCA is to influence public attitudes and the outcome of policy deliberations that impact the Australian Packaging industry and to be actively involved in the public debate about packaging matters.
“The industry needs to be a forceful and compelling advocate in communicating its views to ministers, officials and the general community about the essential role that packaging plays in a modern society such as Australia,” Williams says.
“We don’t seek ‘special treatment but, rather, to develop, argue for and play a role in implementing industry views on what constitutes good public policy.”
Jen Salem adds that the key to meeting the needs of its members successfully is to keep firmly in mind the reason the PCA exists.
“The PCA’s fundamental goal is to deliver real, tangible benefits for its members,” she says. “In the current global financial circumstances, all members are facing the need to reduce their costs, increase their efficiency and respond to a variety of demands from governments and the supply chain.
"Our aim is to help them in that task and to simplify the challenges ahead for them. To give them prior warning of what lies ahead.”
The educational activities of the PCA constitute the organisation’s proudest achievement having been a major focus for several years and has exceeded expectations.
Prudence Scholtes, the PCA’s Education and Community Awareness Manager says the materials the PCA has produced have been embraced by teachers and their students.
"The Pack pack®, a teachers’ resource for primary schools has now been distributed to over 500 schools nationally," Scholtes relates.
"Secondary schools teaching materials have also been widely distributed. For the first time, as part of our Awards program, the PCA conducted the National Schools Package Design Challenge for primary and secondary students. It attracted participation from over 130 schools and 4,200 students nationally.”
The Southern Cross Package Design Awards is also a jewel in the PCA’s crown. “This competition has been running for 24 years,” Salem says.
“There is no other competition globally which is of such long standing nature and of such stature. This year a total of 540 actual entries were received from 32 tertiary institutions nationally."
Jess Brodie who runs the PCA's Australian Packaging Awards says recognising and rewarding industry excellence is an important component of the PCA's educational role.
"We actively seek to raise the bar of industry performance,” Brodie says.
“Credit for these major achievements is due to those farsighted individuals who advocated our educational activities and programs as well as the current staff members of the PCA who have made such a huge contribution in this area,” Gavin Williams says.
Along with education, Williams points to the PCA’s regular monthly meetings forums at which speakers address topical issues as another major achievement of the organisation.
“These have stood the test of time- over 20 years," he says, "and have become an important forum for debate and discussion.
Gavin Williams maintains there are a host of issues confronting the Australian packaging supply chain — international competitiveness, sustainability and environmental policy generally, the supply chain and the changing role of the retailers, as well as the need to educate the general community about the importance of packaging and its contribution to contemporary Australian society.
“The Australian economy is one of the least protected in the world,” he observes. “Accordingly, companies in the Australian packaging supply chain need to be competitive on a global basis.
"The amount of ‘empty’ packaging imported to Australia is rapidly growing. Many companies and the major brand owners operating in Australia are, of course, global companies.
"They want packaging which meets the cost and other standards available in Europe, the Americas and Asia. Packaging is now an internationally traded commodity.
"And, in the long run, Australian companies which are not internationally competitive will not prosper.”
Williams argues that companies must stay abreast of technological changes to compete in a global marketplace.
“We suspect the big changes in the year ahead will be the better use of technology to connect companies with consumers and their wants and needs as well as their supply chain,” he says.
“Adjusting technology to meet changing consumer — and customer demands — will be an integral part of corporate strategy over the next decade.”
Over recent years, ‘Sustainability’ has been at the forefront of the Council’s agenda. “Building on the PCA’s statement entitled ‘Towards Sustainable Packaging’ issued in May 2007, in 2008 the Board released a report entitled ‘The Status of Sustainable Packaging in Australia’,” Williams says.
“It is the first time such a comprehensive, independent report on the sustainability issues concerning packaging has been carried out and publicly released.
“In addition, the PCA has published the third annual edition its booklet ‘Australian Packaging — Real Examples of Change and Innovation’.
This provides ministers, key officials and the general community with specific practical examples of the work being carried out by companies to reduce the environmental impact of their packaging.
It demonstrates that many companies are taking steps to reduce their environmental footprint. Planning for a fourth edition, which offers a new set of case studies, is already well underway.”
With the late Brian Robinson, former Chairman of the Victorian EPA and his staff, the PCA was instrumental in setting up and winning support for the National Packaging Covenant, way back in the mid to late 1990s.
“We will continue to support and promote the Covenant,” Williams says. “It offers the most effective and flexible policy tool to deliver real environmental gains for both governments and industry, as well as the general community.
"It has achieved significant results but it can and must do better. It must deliver real, tangible and measurable outcomes.
“Having said that, the draft documents for a third Covenant are, we believe, unnecessarily lengthy, bureaucratic and complex,” he says.
“The danger is that many signatories will be less inclined to devote the resources, time and energy into complying in a full-blooded and whole-hearted way."
Asked if the PCA supports a national container deposit scheme, Gavin Williams answers with a resounding 'NO!'. “The PCA opposes container deposits,” he says. “We have always done so. Not on any ideological or narrow industry views, but, because it constitutes bad public policy.
"Container deposits would be costly, would compete with the kerbside system and in competing, undermine kerbside operations. It would be an outdated (1970s) policy option.”
“Container deposits have become a populist campaign slogan for a number of environmental groups who have sought to simplify the complexity of waste management policy into one symbolic act,” he argues.
“Their position is heavily influence by a ‘moral’ perspective that industry should bear the cost of such a policy, which ignores the fact that the costs will ultimately be borne by the consumer.”
Gavin Williams says the PCA will continue to aim for a better and more balanced understanding in the general community about the vital role packaging plays in modern Australian society.
“We’ll continue our role of contributing to effective public policy concerning packaging, and most importantly, we’ll continue developing activities that enhance the commercial health of all our members.”
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