Our impact
1. What difference has WRAP made?
WRAP has played a crucial role in helping the UK make better use of resources, cut waste and meet tough environmental directives.
Since WRAP was established in 2000, we have:
- Given practical support to recycling, reprocessing and composting companies to the point where this sector has doubled in size.
- Helped drive the use of recycled plastic in food grade packaging in the UK. This was almost non existent before WRAP started work.
- Brokered highly successful voluntary agreements with industry including the Courtauld Commitment which has helped stop the growth in grocery packaging.
- Over 200 firms have now signed up to a similar commitment with the construction sector to halve the amount of waste they send to landfill.
- Delivered a step change in recycling by UK households through the Recycle Now campaign. Hardly any recycling was done ten years ago. Now more than two thirds of homes recycle as a way of life.
- Highlighted the problem of food waste through the Love Food Hate Waste campaign which has helped cut around 150,000 tonnes of food waste, and save consumers more than £300 million.
- Developed high quality advice for councils on how to implement effective recycling and food waste collections.
2. In the last three years, our work has:
- Helped divert almost 5 million tonnes of waste from landfill.
- Led to two million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent being saved each year.
- Helped an extra four million people become committed recyclers.
- Helped more than one million households become committed to reducing food waste.
Projects commissioned by WRAP are expected to save 15 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases over their lifetimes. We have opened new offices in Wales and Scotland to respond the growing amount of work we are doing for those Governments.
3. What unique role does WRAP play?
WRAP is an organisation of experts, combining professionalism with enthusiasm and a focus on results.
Before WRAP was set up, reducing and avoiding waste were hardly ever talked about. They are now treated as high priority issues by both business and Government, in a large part thanks to WRAP’s work.
WRAP has revolutionised the way the UK thinks about the things we produce and throw away. It is now a given that old newspapers and wine bottles are viewed as valuable resources. That was a slightly wacky idea ten years ago - now it’s mainstream.
The expertise WRAP has built up to bring about this change does not exist in such a concentrated way in other organisations.
4. WRAP's work
Our particular areas of expertise are:
- The reprocessing of materials, such as plastics. One of the world’s leading experts on plastics reprocessing is at WRAP.
- A unique understanding of the recycling and reprocessing business.
- Running successful consumer behaviour change campaigns – Recycle Now and Love Food Hate Waste are recognised as two of the UK’s leading social marketing campaigns.
- Our ability to influence the way business leaders in a wide range of sectors think about waste so they can see the business benefits that more efficient use of resources can bring.
- Many of the people we employ are from the private sector. We understand business and have a commercial approach.
- We attract high calibre staff with specific skills.
- We are a trusted source of information and expertise by the sector and key stakeholders.
- We are small and agile, so can work quickly to address issues, make decisions and make progress.
5. What are WRAP's plans for the future?
WRAP is driven by our belief that resources should be used in an efficient and sustainable way. We have raised public and business concern about all forms of "waste".
Up to now we’ve focussed on reducing the amount of waste going to landfill and recycling as much as possible of what we waste. We believe there is much more we can do to help prevent waste arising in the first place and use resources in a more sustainable way.
For example, by:
- Promoting design which uses resources in a sustainable way.
- Helping the public sector and others to procure in a more sustainable way.
- Creating greater demand for products which contain recycled material or which are recyclable.
- Making sure businesses have easy access to all the guidance and best practices on cutting and avoiding waste which has built up over the past decade.
Following a review by Defra of the organisations and programmes it funded to work on resource efficiency, WRAP was asked to lead the development of a single body for delivery in England. This rationalisation of the delivery landscape includes the work of the Envirowise programme, NISP, Centre for Re-use and Remanufacture, Action Sustainability, the BREW Centre for Local Authorities and the Construction Resources Waste Platform (CRWP). We are currently going through the process of integrating these activities and creating a new single interface for businesses.
Further details regarding our impact
Please follow the underlined weblinks below to read more about our work with partners to make a visible, measurable difference to the way the UK uses and thinks about resources.
1. Waste prevention
Whether at home or at work, reducing the amount of waste we produce is the most effective thing we can do to protect our natural resources, cut costs and reduce our carbon footprint.
2. Collecting and sorting
Helping people recycle as much of their waste as possible is key to reducing the amount of rubbish currently being sent to landfill, and reducing the need to extract virgin materials.
3. Recycling and reprocessing
For the resource efficiency loop to work smoothly there must be sufficient capacity in the UK recycling and reprocessing sector to create demand for recyclable material.
4. Market development
Recycling material through efficient processes, which then create high-value products, is only possible if there are markets for those products.