UK – Bristol-based beer importer Budweiser Budvar has been fined over £400,000 after failing to register with a recycling scheme, a violation that went unnoticed for 18 years.
The Environment Agency (EA) investigation revealed that the company, which should have registered as a packaging producer in 2004, had been unregistered since then.
Under the Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 2007, all obligated packaging producers must register by 7 April 2024. Budweiser Budvar claimed it was unaware of these regulations until the EA began its investigation two years ago.
As a result of the investigation, Budweiser Budvar paid £414,003.54 to the national environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy, contributing to the Great British Spring Clean campaign.
This sum included the savings the company made by not recycling or recovering packaging waste, as well as the EA’s costs and a 30% penalty.
The payment was made as part of a reactive Enforcement Undertaking—a legal agreement between the Environment Agency and an offender, serving as an alternative to prosecution or other financial penalties.
Jake Richardson of the EA commented, “It’s important that businesses take responsibility for the packaging they place on the UK market.
“The Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations ensure that businesses like Budweiser Budvar UK contribute to the cost of recycling the packaging they add to the UK waste stream. In this case, we found they had failed to comply with the regulations and had not paid their rightful share toward recycling.
“Once the company became aware of this, they took steps to rectify the situation, submitting an Enforcement Undertaking offer that ensured all avoided recycling costs were donated to a project benefiting England’s natural environment.”
Richardson added that Budweiser Budvar UK is now fully compliant with the packaging regulations and has implemented processes to ensure continued compliance in the future.
He noted, “Enforcement Undertakings, when appropriate, provide a better resolution for the environment than prosecution, allowing offenders who take responsibility for their actions to put things right voluntarily, in a way that directly benefits the environment and local communities.”
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