National Packaging Targets Beyond 2025: Keeping Australia’s Benchmark for Accountability

Australia’s National Packaging Targets remain Australia’s core accountability benchmark for packaging outcomes. With the support of Australia’s Environment Ministers, the Targets will continue beyond 2025 to keep benchmarking consistent and to focus reform on what is holding the system back. The latest national Consumption and Recovery Data (2023–24) shows Australia is still short across key measures, including packaging that is reusable, recyclable or compostable; plastics that are recycled or composted; recycled content; and reductions in problematic and unnecessary single-use packaging. 

The focus now should be on the system conditions required to deliver these outcomes at scale. Many of the constraints are well understood: economics, where doing the right thing can still cost more than doing the easy thing; consistency, where definitions, evidence requirements and enforcement vary by jurisdiction; capability, where collection, sorting and reprocessing capacity is not yet sufficient or not located where it is needed; and clarity, where people want to do the right thing but disposal guidance and recovery pathways do not align. 

On the current trajectory, Australia will continue to miss the Targets without reform that addresses these structural barriers. That is why APCO is advocating for nationally consistent regulation and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) settings that strengthen participation, accountability and enforcement, while supporting an orderly, well-managed transition that protects early investment and gives businesses confidence to plan and invest. 

As Australia’s packaging co-regulator, APCO will keep the Targets in view, use national data to pinpoint the constraints, and work with governments and industry on reforms that shift outcomes. Brand owners have a critical role now: continue lifting packaging performance and invest in credible, auditable data and evidence governance, so progress can be verified, compared consistently, and trusted. 

Current national performance  

The latest national Consumption and Recovery Data (2023–24) shows progress, but the Targets are not yet being met: 

• 86% of packaging is reusable, recyclable or compostable (Target 100%). 
• 20% of plastic packaging is recycled or composted (Target 70%). 
• 44% average post-consumer recycled content across packaging (Target 50%). 
• 46% reduction (from the 2017–18 baseline) in the priority items measured for problematic and unnecessary single-use plastics (APCO).