Fuji Xerox maps product stewardship

Last Friday in Auckland, the Associate Environment Minister, the Honourable Eugenie Sage, together with Fuji Xerox New Zealand (FXNZ) launched the Roadmap to Product Stewardship.
 
The Roadmap, an open source guide – developed by FXNZ in conjunction with the Ministry for the Environment, the Sustainable Business Network, and the Ministry for the Environment accredited product stewardship scheme managers – aims to get businesses to think about how they are managing their products’ environmental impacts so they can take the first step to a circular economy.
 
Peter Thomas, managing director at FXNZ, says the Roadmap helps companies better understand their product lifecycles and identify areas of opportunity for the reuse, recycling and/or repurposing of their products through putting in place a product stewardship scheme. He says, “Product stewardship is about collaborating with our suppliers and customers to manage the products we use in a responsible way. So instead of adopting the traditional take, make, waste approach, we have a circular economy where the materials used in our products retain their quality as much as possible to ensure they can continue to be reused as a result of effective product management.”
 
The Roadmap guides businesses through six key steps to help them develop tailored product stewardship schemes. It helps them understand how more circular products and product lifecycles can be established by engaging with other businesses across the value chain. Circular products are ones where the lifecycle and usage has been maximised and, at the end of the lifecycle, they are completely reused.
 
Thomas says, “Waste in New Zealand landfills is rising by five per cent a year. We want to help local businesses find creative, circular solutions for disposing and managing products and lessening the burden on the environment.”
 
FXNZ currently operates its own product stewardship scheme, which the Minister for the Environment has formally accredited. The company offers customers a free take-back service which achieves a reuse and recycling rate of over 99.5 per cent for returned machines, used printer cartridges, drums, fusers and developer to ensure they are reused, remanufactured, and ultimately recycled responsibly. Recently, FXNZ has partnered with Close the Loop for its toner recycling which is formulated with other waste products to create TonerPave a more durable low carbon asphalt that helps to reduce the carbon footprint of a road by up to 23 percent over its lifecycle.
 
Thomas says, “The Minister’s attendance at the launch is greatly appreciated – Fuji Xerox New Zealand is committed to the idea of a circular economy and believe we can help other businesses do the same. We want to thank the Ministry for the Environment and the Sustainable Business Network for their time and contribution to the process.”
 
The Minister for the Environment has accredited 15 voluntary product stewardship schemes operating across New Zealand. These businesses, along with their suppliers, collectively have prevented 1.3 million tonnes of products from going to landfill unnecessarily. Thomas adds, “There are many businesses doing great work across New Zealand in relation to product stewardship and we know there is an opportunity for others to join us.”
 
The launch of FXNZ’s Product Stewardship Roadmap follows the release last week of the SBN and Auckland Tourism, Events and Economic Development’s report outlining how a circular economy could add $8.8 billion to Auckland’s economy.