Can our policy asks help to deliver a Circular Economy?

At Enrich the Earth we have sought to get an understanding as to why successive governments have not introduced a ban on the sale of peat despite numerous campaigns urging them to do so. Our view is that government hasn’t been persuaded because companies have successfully argued that this will hit UK businesses, highlighting the cost and difficulty of change whilst the campaigning groups have been unable to consistently generate a strong enough demand from the public calling for a ban.

Will this change with a new government? Campaign groups have sought to raise the profile with a letter to the Prime Minister signed by over 100 organisations including many companies. Momentum for change is increasing with most retailers voluntarily phasing out peat sales for amateur gardeners. However, there is still resistance and tricky areas where change is unlikely to happen in the foreseeable future without government intervention. 

It is possible that a call for an outright ban will now work and it is important for the campaigning groups to continuing advocating, but we wondered whether the call could be strengthened by taking a slightly different approach. The question we asked is: Are there existing policies that are inadvertently hindering the change and if these alter would there be less resistance to an overall ban?

Through extensive conversations with a wide range of organisations, we have learned that in many cases it still isn’t cost-effective for growers to use alternatives to peat, in fact there is a premium faced by those trying to do the right thing for the environment. We have discovered that DEFRA hasn’t fully considered the benefits to soil quality and carbon storage that could be delivered through increased composting, and we have understood the huge un-tapped potential from improving how we manage our food and garden waste. These policy barriers are acting as a block to a more circular economy which utilises existing waste streams to replace peat. 

These conversations have led us to identify how the policy-framework might be altered to reduce the cost and increase access to materials that could help to replace peat with more sustainable alternatives. We have examined how DEFRA could take a more holistic view on how they assess the impact of their policies on carbon and soil quality and have considered how existing policies could be refined providing short-term support helping to help cover the transitional costs companies face. 

Our belief is that these policy changes could create a more circular economy and deliver on three of the government’s five stated environmental ambitions by helping to create a zero-waste economy, boost food security and support nature recovery. To test our theory, we have employed a specialist public affairs agency called Seahorse Environmental who are having further conversations with the sector to refine our asks and are assessing how these could be best framed to fit with the new policy agenda.

We recognise that the government has a huge amount to address, that our policy asks are niche and are not in the forefront of public attention meaning that securing the attention and time of decision-makers will be challenging. However, we believe that the areas identified will help to create a stronger policy bedrock that will help deliver on government objectives enabling a more circular approach. We will keep you informed of progress.