Product stewardship
An important aspect of our product stewardship is to ensure we reduce our overall packaging and encourage greater reuse/recycling of packaging waste.
Packaging is not only an important component of the carbon and energy debate, but also features strongly in community perceptions around waste and litter. There is a community debate about how best to deal with packaging waste, with some advocating economic models to deal with it, whether national advanced disposal levies or container deposit tax proposals. Ultimately, the costs of any solution will be borne by the community and we need to make sure that the community gets the most effective return on its investment.
For this reason, we believe the most effective investment in product stewardship would be on a whole-of-waste stream solution as opposed to a solution focused on beverage containers only, which perform well on recycling rates in comparison with the rest of the waste stream. Figures are not available for the waste stream but containers make up only 2.3% (Australian National Litter Index, Nov 2009) of the litter stream.
ENVIRONMENTAL CONTROL MEASURES & MITIGATION PROGRAMS
| INTERNAL | EXTERNAL |
|---|---|
| Policies and Procedures Strategic Plans Accountabilities and Objectives Environmental Management Systems Environmental Management Programs Key Performance Indicators Environmental Scorecards Capital Expenditure Programs Sustainability Ambassadors Program Supplier Review Risk Champion Process |
Water Efficiency Programs Energy Efficiency Programs Packaging Stewardship Forum/Scheme Packaging Recovery and Litter Programs Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Australian Packaging Covenant Environmental Code of Practice for Packaging National Pollutant Inventory Stakeholder Engagement Peak industry Association Memberships External Benchmarking |
Ingredients and materials
Raw materials
Lion Nathan has about 44% of the beer market in Australia, and 52% of the beer market in New Zealand. Our use of raw materials is roughly proportionate to our market share.
The vast majority of our products are derived from agricultural ingredients that are regenerating. Key ingredients are:
- hops
- barley
- cane sugar
- water
- grapes
- yeast
Packaging materials
Our packaging materials include:
- glass bottles
- aluminium cans
- steel kegs
- cardboard cartons
- cardboard carryracks
- bottle closures
- labels
- shrink wrap
Approximately 96.5% of our packaging materials are recyclable and contain, on average, around 30% recycled content. Steel kegs are returned and refilled after cleaning and sterilisation.