Will voluntary guidelines for packaging source reduction be enough?

摘要

Many municipalities throughout the U.S. have developed voluntary collection and recycling programs, such as curb side collection and collection centres (e.g., municipal, churches, clubs, etc.). Wal-Mart has established its packaging scorecard program for its vendors. Many corporations have self-imposed company guidelines to reduce the total amount of packaging materials used. All of these programs are designed to somehow reduce the total amount of packaging materials used. The basic question is, are these voluntary programs sufficient?rnAs the 2008 presidential election approaches, there are a growing number of people in the packaging community who believe that some type of mandated federal collection and recycling program may be implemented depending on who becomes the next president.