New Zealand regulates packaging through bans and a rising landfill levy, while its plastic packaging stewardship scheme and container deposits remain undecided

One Act, many tools: what the Waste Minimisation Act 2008 allows

The Waste Minimisation Act 2008 is the parent statute for every packaging measure in New Zealand. The version on New Zealand Legislation is stated as at 24 September 2025. It holds three families of tools that matter for packaging: product stewardship in Part 2, regulations on products in section 23, and the waste disposal levy in Part 3.

Product stewardship. Under section 9 the Minister may declare a product a priority product by Gazette notice, after advice from the Waste Advisory Board and public comment, where the product may cause significant harm as waste or where its reduction, reuse or recycling offers significant benefits. Sections 13 to 17 let a scheme manager apply for accreditation, set out what a scheme must contain, such as measurable objectives and funding, and cap accreditation at seven years after notice of accreditation, or an earlier stated expiry.

Regulations. Section 23 lets regulations control or prohibit the disposal of products or waste, control or prohibit the manufacture or sale of products containing specified materials, require take-back services, set product management fees, require refundable deposits, prescribe labelling and require information to be given to the Secretary. Each of the main packaging tools used abroad, from bans to EPR fees to deposits, therefore already has a power in New Zealand law.

The levy. Section 26 imposes a levy on waste disposed of at a disposal facility, and section 27 sets it at the prescribed rate or, where none is prescribed, at NZD 10 a tonne excluding GST. Disposal facility operators pay the levy on the weight of material disposed of at their facility, and the rate schedule is published by the Ministry (Exhibit 2).

Penalties. Section 65(1)(d) makes it an offence to knowingly contravene regulations made under section 23(1)(a), (b), (g) or (h), with a fine not exceeding NZD 100,000. Breaches of regulations under section 23(1)(c), (d), (e), (f) or (i), which cover take-back, fees, deposits, labelling and information, carry the same maximum under section 65(1)(c), and section 68 removes the need to prove intent for that group. SPI analysis: the plastic bans rest on section 23(1)(b), so a prosecution would need knowledge; a future deposit or fee regulation would fall under the strict liability group.

The landfill levy: NZD 10 to NZD 75 in six years

The levy is the strongest price signal in New Zealand’s packaging system, although it is charged on disposal rather than on packaging placed on the market. The rate for Class 1 municipal landfills was NZD 10 a tonne from 2009. Since 1 July 2021 the Government has progressively increased and expanded it, and the Ministry’s site operator page sets out the full schedule to 2027 (Exhibit 2).

The schedule has two phases. The first, legislated before 2024, took the Class 1 rate from NZD 20 in 2021 to NZD 60 on 1 July 2024. On 31 May 2024 the Government agreed a second phase, incremental and phased over 2025/26, 2026/27 and 2027/28, which the Ministry describes as slower than the previous four years. SPI calculation: Class 1 steps were NZD 10, NZD 20 and NZD 10 a year from 2022 to 2024, and NZD 5 a year from 2025 to 2027 (Exhibit 3).

The 2024 changes also widened what the money can fund. The Minister for the Environment, Hon Penny Simmonds, announced on 30 May 2024 that a Budget 2024 bill would let the central government portion of the levy fund a broader range of environmental outcomes, such as freshwater catchment restoration, emergency waste disposal and the clean-up of contaminated sites and vulnerable landfills, while local government keeps its 50% share. The Cabinet papers name the Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill, approved by the Cabinet Legislation Committee on 23 May 2024 for introduction on 30 May 2024 under Budget urgency, with enactment targeted by 1 July 2024. The Ministry’s work programme states that from 1 July 2024 projects to remediate contaminated sites are funded through the levy.

The Budget 2024 factsheet projected levy revenue of NZD 1.195 billion over 2024/25 to 2027/28 under the new schedule, split NZD 598 million each to central and local government, against NZD 1.025 billion under the previous settings. SPI calculation: the change adds NZD 170 million over four years, about 17% more revenue.

The plastic bans: what is out, since when

The bans sit in the Waste Minimisation (Plastic and Related Products) Regulations 2022, SL 2022/69, made by Order in Council on 14 March 2022 under section 23(1)(b) (PR-NZ-001). The Environment Minister, Hon David Parker, set the three-stage timetable on 27 June 2021 after almost 8,000 responses to consultation, and the Government estimated the policy would remove more than two billion single-use plastic items from landfill or the environment each year.

The amending regulations, SL 2022/312, were made on 28 November 2022, notified in the Gazette on 1 December 2022 and came into force on 1 July 2023. They added cutlery, produce bags and tableware to the regulation 5 bans, created regulation 6 for straws and produce labels, and added regulation 7, which allows straws to be supplied to people with a health condition or disability that requires them. Exhibit 4 sets out the groups.

The produce label date moved once. SL 2022/312 exempted labels on imported fruit and vegetables until 1 July 2025. Cabinet’s Economic Policy Committee agreed an extension on 13 November 2024, the Cabinet Legislation Committee authorised the amendment regulations on 13 March 2025, and they came into force on 1 May 2025, moving the date for fully home compostable labels to 1 July 2028 for domestic and imported produce, adhesive included (2025 proactive release). The paper gives the main reason as no trading partners having similar rules in place by July 2025. It estimates 7.5 billion produce labels a year, 98% of them non-home compostable plastic before 2023, and puts the cost of switching to home compostable labels at 50% to 80% more, from a 2024 industry engagement.

The scope tests are narrow and material-based. Plastic bowls or plates forming part of a container with a lid fall outside the tableware ban, fibre tableware with a plastic lining is not caught, and compostable or plant-based plastic versions of the July 2023 items are banned, produce labels aside (PR-NZ-001). Sale includes offering, distributing and supplying free of charge, so imported and given-away items are caught.

Enforcement now sits with the Secretary for the Environment. The Environment (Disestablishment of Ministry for the Environment) Amendment Act 2026, 2026 No 22, received assent on 2 June 2026 and came into force on 1 July 2026; it disestablishes the Ministry and passes its functions to the statutory office of the Secretary for the Environment. The bill’s commentary states that the Government intends the chief executive of the new Ministry of Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport to fulfil that role. The Ministry’s published guidance said it took an educational approach first and acted on systemic or ongoing breaches (PR-NZ-001). SPI has not yet confirmed a published prosecution under SL 2022/69.

Stage 3: PVC and polystyrene on hold

Stage 3 was meant to remove all PVC and polystyrene food and drink packaging not covered by the earlier phase-outs from mid-2025, as set out on 27 June 2021. On 18 December 2024 the Government removed the 2025 deadline; the Ministry’s plastic phase-out page says further work in the coming months will inform next steps, and on 25 October 2026 it still showed no new date (PR-NZ-002).

The policy history shows how far the timetable has moved. On 12 August 2020 the Associate Minister for the Environment proposed all bans by January 2025; on 27 June 2021 the final timetable put the last stage at mid-2025; and since 18 December 2024 the last stage has had no date at all.

Exhibit 5 places the main dated steps across all instruments in order.

Priority products: packaging is declared, but not yet regulated

The Government named six priority products in July 2020, gazetted under the Declaration of Priority Products Notice 2020. A declaration does not itself impose a duty. It signals that the Minister wants a stewardship scheme accredited for the product and opens the path to regulations. Exhibit 6 shows how far each product has travelled.

The tyre and farm plastics cases show the sequence a packaging scheme would follow: declaration, industry co-design, accreditation, then regulations that set a fee and make participation compulsory. On 7 September 2026 the Minister for the Environment, Hon Nicola Grigg, announced that the regulated Rural Recycling Scheme will start on 1 March 2027, with producers paying a small fee on products sold and existing voluntary schemes running until then.

The official page says the Government is working with industry and stakeholders on the next stages of scheme development. Hon Penny Simmonds recognised the draft design in her 28 May 2024 speech to the WasteMINZ conference. SPI analysis: six years after declaration, plastic packaging is behind tyres and farm plastics at every step. The industry design exists; what is missing is accreditation or regulations.

The 2025 reform proposals and where they stand

The Government consulted from April 2025 to 11:59pm on 1 June 2025 on amending the Waste Minimisation Act 2008 and folding in the Litter Act 1979 (consultation document ME 1887). Hon Penny Simmonds had set out that aim in May 2024. The proposals would change how a packaging scheme is built (Exhibit 7).

The Ministry’s work programme page states that Cabinet has agreed to new, fit-for-purpose waste legislation and that the Government intends to enact it before the general election in 2026. SPI has not yet confirmed the introduction of a bill on New Zealand Legislation, and it has not yet confirmed the date of the 2026 general election. SPI analysis: if the framework passes as proposed, accreditation of voluntary packaging schemes ends and the route to a packaging scheme becomes regulation through an appointed producer responsibility organisation. If it does not pass, the 2008 Act’s accreditation and section 23 routes remain.

Container deposits: designed, then deferred

New Zealand came closest to a packaging producer scheme with beverage containers. The Transforming Recycling consultation ran from 13 March to 22 May 2022, and the container return scheme was one of three proposals (Ministry container return scheme page). On 28 November 2022 Cabinet agreed to implement a New Zealand Container Return Scheme with the key design elements consulted on (Exhibit 8).

The minute records that a 20 cent deposit was consulted on and drew high support, that large beverage producers favoured 10 cents, and that legislation would set a minimum 10 cent deposit (paragraphs 111 to 114). On 13 March 2023 the then Prime Minister, Rt Hon Chris Hipkins, listed deferring work on the container return scheme among measures to focus on the cost of living. On 28 May 2024 Hon Penny Simmonds told the WasteMINZ conference that the Government would be considering options for single-use beverage containers. The current work programme says future plans might include a beverage container return scheme, made possible by improvements to waste legislation.

Kerbside: the one recycling standard that survived

Standard kerbside materials apply across most of New Zealand from 1 February 2024 (Exhibit 9). Hon David Parker announced the standard on 29 March 2023 alongside food scraps collections for urban households by 2030, after almost 90% of 6,400 submissions supported standardised recycling.

The Ministry expects the standard to divert an extra 36,000 tonnes of recycling from landfill each year, almost 30 kg per household, and states that about 16% of items put out for recycling do not belong in the bin. On 18 December 2024 the Government dropped the other four household recycling policies agreed in November 2022, including the urban food scraps requirement, leaving the standard materials list as the only one in effect, with support for council collections through the Waste Minimisation Fund instead.

A framework: New Zealand's five packaging levers

SPI reads New Zealand’s packaging system as five levers, all held in the 2008 Act. Each is a different kind of duty, and they move at different speeds (Exhibit 10).

The levers have a practical reading. Levers 1 to 3 shape cost and design today, and they are where compliance work sits. Levers 4 and 5 are where future fees sit. SPI analysis: a business that designs to the kerbside list and has its resin data in order is ready for lever 2 tightening, and the same data is the base any lever 4 fee would need. The contrast with Australia is instructive as context: Australia relies on a co-regulatory Covenant and has set aside a Commonwealth scheme this term, as SPI’s Australia piece sets out, while New Zealand uses binding bans but no producer scheme for packaging.

Scenario: what the levy path means in NZD

The levy is the one packaging-related cost with a published path. Exhibit 11 applies the three published Class 1 rates from 2025 to 2027 to two quantities: 1,000 tonnes of residual waste sent to a municipal landfill, and the 36,000 tonnes a year that standard kerbside recycling is expected to divert.

The scenarios make two points. SPI analysis: at the 2026 rate, the levy on a tonne of landfilled packaging is seven times what it was before July 2021, so packaging that is landfilled rather than recycled now carries a visible cost for anyone paying a waste contractor. And the gains from diversion are modest at national scale, about NZD 2.5 million a year from the kerbside standard, which is one reason the debate has turned to producer-funded schemes.

The produce label change gives a second, percentage-only sensitivity. The 2025 proactive release puts the cost of commercially compostable labels at 30% to 70% more in the original impact statement, and of home compostable labels at 50% to 80% more from the 2024 industry engagement, expected to fall as alternatives emerge. SPI calculation: on 7.5 billion labels a year, every unit of label cost borne in the base case rises to 1.5 units at the low end of that range and 1.8 units at the high end. SPI has not yet confirmed a unit label price in NZD, so no money total is given.

Voluntary schemes: what industry runs today

Several industry schemes collect packaging today. Each is voluntary: none is a regulated scheme for a priority product, and SPI reports them from their own pages (Exhibit 12).

The Ministry’s soft plastics story describes the Soft Plastic Recycling Scheme as a voluntary, government-accredited scheme funded by member brand owners, whose members represent about 70% of the food and grocery products packaged in the plastics it can process. The page gives no accreditation date. SPI analysis: voluntary schemes cover the streams where collection already works or where the kerbside list leaves a gap. Under the 2025 proposals they would lose the option of accreditation, which makes the regulated route the only one with legal weight.