Olympic Legacy Transfer Report: Packaging

We interviewed key caterers, food and drink suppliers and packaging suppliers to The Games, in order to gain an understanding of what they had to do to meet the guidelines, including key challenges and successes along the way.

The guidelines stipulated the following:

• What packaging could be used (either reusable, widely recycled or, where neither was possible, compostable)
• What materials could be used (certain materials considered difficult to recycle or those considered more hazardous, such as PVC, were not permitted within the scope of the specification, and certain levels of recycled content was required within certain materials)
• The labelling requirements for packaging (all packaging was required to be labelled using either the UK’s On-Pack Recycling Label (OPRL) for retail items, or The Games specific on-pack logos for catering packaging. They consisted of a black non-recyclable label, a green recycling label or an orange compostable label)

By speaking to suppliers about the success and challenges of both the process of developing the guidelines and the technical requirements, it allowed us to understand how successful the use of guidelines could be for future events.

Whilst The Games were a large-scale event, over which LOCOG had considerable control, many of the findings taken from the research were considered to be of relevance to events of various sizes and scale.

The results of our work are being fed into WRAP’s tools and best practice guidance for packaging usage at events, as well as to LOCOG’s Post Games Sustainability Report – A Legacy of Change. Both of which will help the events sector in the future.