REDcycle’s collapse is more proof that plastic recycling is a broken system

Australia’s largest soft plastic recycling program, REDcycle was suspended after it was revealed soft plastic items collected at Woolworths and Coles had been stockpiled for months in warehouses and not recycled.

The abrupt halt to the soft plastics recycling scheme has left many consumers deeply disappointed, and the sense of betrayal is understandable. Recycling, with its familiar “chasing arrows” symbol, has been portrayed by the plastics industry as the answer to the single-use plastics problem for years.