Lloyd’s Register joins 3R anti-plastic waste initiative

Food safety auditing company Lloyd’s Register (LR) has joined the 3R Initiative to help its members develop a new “Project Standard”, designed to tackle the global issue of plastic waste.

Founded in 2019 by sustainable standard owner Verra and environmental organisation BVRio, the 3R (Reduce, Recover and Recycle) initiative is designed to develop a market-based approach that will increase recovery and recycling activities and increase accountability for plastic waste reduction efforts around the world. The 3RI’s flexible mechanism, underpinned by robust standards, will transparently and sustainably increase the value of plastic waste and incentivize new activities that support the circular economy.

Since its founding, the initiative has been joined by several global food, beverage, and packaging companies including Nestlé, Danone, Veolia, and Tetra Pak. It brings together food businesses, industry experts and NGOs who have all committed to work together to develop, test and implement three solutions designed to recover, reduce and recycle plastic waste more effectively.

One of these solutions is the Project Standard, which will work by establishing a framework to measure the true impact of the recovery and/or recycling of waste activities, while educating adopters on the implementation of appropriate environmental and social safeguards. These actions will be verified by independent auditors.

Examples of activities assessed under the Project Standard – which will soon be released for public consultation – are recyclable material recovery projects, waste collections including ocean clean-ups and community projects, development of new local infrastructure to recycle waste and new technology development.