Environmental campaigners will present a petition to Parliament on Tuesday, calling for the Government introduce a cash-for-trash scheme.
The Kiwi Bottle Drive, a campaign to reduce the number of plastic bottles finding their way into New Zealand's waterways, wants the Government to initiate a bottle-deposit scheme that refunds people when they recycle.
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A petition organised by the campaigners has received more than 15,000 signatures on website Action Station and will be presented to Parliament on Tuesday.
Campaigner Holly Dove said the scheme not only has proven sustainability results, but could benefit the wider community as well.
"It's getting really amazing recycling results overseas as well as really great litter reduction rates. It also has heaps of cool benefits for the wider community, things like fundraising," she said.
"Some people might want to donate their bottles to the local school or the local scouts groups and they can do big fundraisers with them."
According to the petition, proposed bottle deposits would give people a refund of greater than 10 cents when they recycle a bottle.
Ms Dove said it would easy for the public to get involved.
"How it would work is that you would have places where people can return their beverage containers. So that could be really easy to find spots like at the supermarket," she said.
On Monday, a new report found that recycling wouldn't be enough to save Aotearoa from the scourge of unwanted plastic waste even if it's "radically improved".
Due to the rise of light, cheap and durable plastic packaging, as well as a lack of proper processes and systems to help with recycling, a global waste and pollution crisis had ensued, according to James Griffin, the head of the Sustainable Business Network's Circular Economy Accelerator (CEA) unit.
The CEA, which published the report, said a circular economy where all materials were reused and nothing was wasted was paramount to moving in the right direction.
Newshub.
