Why are particular waste streams being targeted?

In late 2019, the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) agreed that Australia should ban the export of unprocessed waste plastic, paper and cardboard, glass and tyres while building Australia's capacity to generate high value recycled commodities and associated demand.

Following this decision, in early 2020 after a period of industry consultation and market analysis, COAG agreed to the following implementation timetable for the phased withdrawal of exported recyclables:

• unprocessed glass - from 1 January 2021
• mixed Plastics - 1 July 2021
• whole used tyres - 1 December 2021
• single resin/polymer plastics - 1 July 2022
• mixed and unsorted paper and cardboard - 1 July 2024.

Both the Queensland Recycling Modernisation Fund and the RRRMF provide funding support for these target waste streams.