Waste management regulation: policy solutions and policy shortcomings

A model of packaging waste management is presented to explore the policy options available to governments to implement waste regulation in light of the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). Our model endogenizes the packaging design as an additional determinant for the overall amount of waste jointly with consumers' sorting effort and producers' output decisions. The model shows that the policies that yield the first-best allocation may not find public support. Furthermore, if the set of available policy instruments is limited, production and consumption of the good is likely to settle on a sub-optimal level even though the optimal allocation may be achievable. Finally, the model demonstrates that a landfill tax may actually increase landfill waste in the presence of tradable credits for recycling activities. The results shed light on some shortcomings of existing regulatory schemes such as the Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations of the UK.