Key briefing How is extended producer responsibility incentivising better packaging, and what are the key questions driving design choices?
As extended producer responsibility (EPR) schemes reshape the economics of packaging, business leaders are embracing collaborative innovation and circular design principles to transform what consumers consider “convenient”. This brief collects expert insights on EPR, including an interview with Amcor’s chief sustainability officer David Clark, and key takeaways from the in-person and virtual discussions we facilitated in 2025 as part of the Sustainable Packaging Innovation Forum series.
EPR creates financial incentives for better packaging design, the funding of recycling infrastructure, and improvement of collection rates. However, companies face a patchwork of regulations across regions—from state-by-state US rules to varying national requirements within Europe itself. This raises important questions on where to invest resources for packaging innovation, thinking in horizons from immediate wins to wider changes that will benefit the business in the long-term.
What emerged from our conversations with experts across the packaging and packaging waste value chain is that viable sustainable packaging solutions exist and the technology works, but weak economics and gaps in enabling infrastructure remains the main barrier to adoption at scale. Whether regulatory momentum and appetite for innovation can overcome cost barriers remains the defining question for packaging innovation in 2026.
VideoInsights from...
Chief Sustainability Officer
Amcor
Senior Marketing Manager
Innovation Forum
Associate
Innovation Forum
"What I like to see is an end-state vision of what we want five years or 10 years out, and then let’s work backwards, as opposed to starting with only what we have today and then try to tweak that to get where we’re going"
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