FAQ - Covered products
All packaging is covered by producer responsibility - however, packaging covered by the deposit and return system is excluded.
Packaging:
All items of any kind and material used for packing, protecting, handling, delivering from the producer to the user or consumer, and presenting goods, whether raw materials or processed goods.
All single-use items used for the same purpose, as well as beverage containers and cups for beverages that are single-use plastic products, should likewise be regarded as packaging.
Relevant types of packaging:
- sales packaging (primary packaging)
- grouped packaging (secondary packaging)
- transport packaging (tertiary packaging)
- service packaging
- reusable packaging
- primary production packaging.
In order to best prepare the company, it is important to have control over what packaging is used, and not least what components and materials the packaging consists of.
If the company is above the triviality limit, the ongoing reporting must be eco-modulated – read here ongoing reporting. The eco-modulation entails that, based on a series of design criteria, one must be able to place their packaging in red, yellow, or green categories.
The design criteria dictate which data the company must collect on its packaging.
Read more about the eco-modulation in the Danish Environmental Protection Agency's guidance here:
The main rule is that the producer responsibility belongs to the company that first makes available packaging or packaged products on the Danish market.
The crucial factor for determining the producer responsibility is whether the packaging/packaged products have been designed/manufactured under their own name and trademark, or if they are generic packaging.
Packaging/packaged products manufactured/designed under own name and trademark
In the Danish Environmental Protection Agency's guidance (Danish), it states that responsibility can be assigned to another company than the manufacturer if one of the following conditions is met:
- If a company has the packaging designed
- If a company has the packaging manufactured in the company's own name
- If a company has packaging manufactured under its own trademark.
Generic packaging
According to the Danish Environmental Protection Agency, generic packaging must be understood as the opposite of the above. In these cases, it is the manufacturer (if established in Denmark) who has the producer responsibility.
Overall, it is therefore important for a company to be aware of whether it manufactures packaging for a company that meets one of the three conditions mentioned above, as this is crucial for determining responsibility.
The Danish Environmental Protection Agency states that there is a concrete assessment of when packaging is considered generic and when it can be said to be manufactured or designed under its own name and trademark. In cases of doubt, Dansk Producentansvar (DPA), as the authority, can make decisions regarding the individual product.
A packaging that is not reusable packaging.
See more regarding definitions of packaging here:
Prepare for producer responsibility with good packaging design
Packaging that has been conceived, designed, and brought to market with the intention of undergoing a number of trips or cycles during its lifetime by being refilled or reused for the same purpose it was designed for.
For packaging to be categorized as reusable packaging, it is essential that the company takes back the packaging with the intention of placing it back on the market in its original form. There will be specific rules for how the quantities of reusable packaging that are added and taken back from the market should be accounted for. Read more:
Reporting of reusable packaging
DPA states the following:
In relation to reusable packaging, it is important to distinguish between "reusable packaging" defined in the regulation and the reuse of packaging. A packaging is not reusable packaging simply because it is reused as packaging. If it is a matter of reusing packaging, it is crucial whether a previous party has taken the producer responsibility for the packaging.
If company A from Denmark reuses cardboard boxes as packaging, which they received as packaging from company B from Denmark, that has reported the cardboard boxes as packaging in the producer responsibility register, the cardboard boxes do not need to be reported again.
It is also not considered "reusable packaging" simply because a packaging is made up of recycled materials.
Read more about reusable packaging here:
Prepare for producer responsibility with good packaging design
What separates one-way packaging from reusable packaging is whether the packaging is designed to be part of an established reuse system that ensures that the reusable packaging is returned and used multiple times for the same purpose for which it is designed.
A one-way packaging does not become a reusable packaging simply because it is used again (and it is a good idea).
Read more here:
Learn more about packaging definitions here:
Prepare for producer responsibility with good packaging design
Labels that are directly attached to a product or placed in any other way on the product are a packaging.
Self-adhesive labels placed on another packaging article are part of the packaging.
Read here for more information about packaging
The Environmental Protection Agency has indicated that tape in itself is packaging.
Read more about the allocation of responsibility for labels and tape
The producer responsibility for single-use plastic products is a separate producer responsibility. It is also referred to as SUP (Single Used Plastic). The producer responsibility means that the companies involved must pay for the costs of collection, clean-up, and waste treatment of littered waste and emptying of public trash cans.
There are two different statutory orders for single-use plastic products and packaging.
Read more about the obligations regarding single-use plastic here
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