The tipping floor is overflowing, and the sorting line is moving at a blistering pace. Yet, when you look down the line, the number of sorters handling the load hasn’t changed in a year or more. Your team is frustrated and overworked, and bottlenecks are forming everywhere. If any or all of this sounds familiar, you’re not imagining things. And you’re not alone.
Materials recovery facility operators and recycling facility managers everywhere are noticing a widening gap between the volume of materials and their available workforce. And perhaps like you, they’re wondering how we got here. The answer lies in the rise of Extended Producer Responsibility—or EPR—policies and laws and the domino effect they’ve had on the recycling and materials recovery sectors.
Facilities that haven’t adjusted their staffing strategy to handle the surge caused by EPR are at risk of burning out their existing workforce and falling permanently behind their peers in the industry. One thing is for sure: the material will keep coming. But will your recycling operations staffing plan be able to keep up? Here’s what you need to know about keeping pace with EPR staffing challenges.
What EPR Is (and Why You Should Care)
Extended Producer Responsibility is a branch of environmental policy that holds manufacturers and brand owners responsible for the entire product lifecycle, including the end-of-life phase, long after consumers are done with the products.
While EPR legislation can take different approaches, there’s a common theme in the packaging mandates. In short, EPR shifts the financial burden of managing post-consumer packaging from local governments and directly to the producers. More producer accountability means larger investments in recycling infrastructure, which leads to broader curbside access for households, and, ultimately, much more material entering the waste stream.
The data shows the impact EPR policies have had. Jurisdictions with established EPR frameworks have seen collection and recycling rates for specific packaging types top 75%. This figure is significantly higher than in regions that have yet to adopt EPR frameworks.
What the Map Means for Volume
So, while the impacts of EPR can be felt in facilities nationwide, they will be more noticeable in the states that have wholeheartedly embraced EPR.
Currently, seven states have active EPR packaging laws on the books. This includes Maine, Oregon, Colorado, California, Minnesota, Maryland, and Washington. The volume implications for facilities operating in or near these markets are staggering. But even if your facility is outside these seven states, the ripple effect of national brands changing their packaging and expanding their recovery efforts will soon hit your tipping floors.
Regardless of where your facility sits on the map, state-level mandates have already permanently altered the national waste stream. As EPR policies expand, expecting traditional operational and staffing models to absorb untold extra tonnages is clearly an operational mistake. A new approach to waste management workforce planning is in order.
How EPR Impacts Your Staffing Strategies
Even without EPR, you’re probably already aware of the high turnover and retention issues in waste management workforce planning. Adding volume at a relentless pace will only increase the pressure on an already strained workforce. Facilities that staff reactively, hiring only after the tipping floor backs up, will inevitably suffer from bottlenecks, increased contamination rates, and employee burnout.
Meanwhile, facilities that build flexible, reliable labor pipelines ahead of volume increases can handle the surge and maintain their profit margins. Partnering with an experienced recycling operations staffing agency is the key to scaling your workforce as needed. As legislation changes, you can be confident your team can handle it, all without the overhead of permanent overstaffing.
HireQuest Direct, the Partner for Times of Expansion
With seven states already leading the way on EPR initiatives, MRFs can no longer rely on yesterday’s headcount to process today’s volume. Your facility must transition from reactive hiring to a proactive strategy that can easily handle periods when changing legislation and shifting times increase the volume running through your facility.
HireQuestDirect is an experienced recycling operations staffing partner. We have the flexible workforce required to expand headcount as needed for EPR staffing challenges. To get started, contact a HireQuest Direct location near you today.
