Our Certifications

As an organisation we are extremely conscious of our carbon footprint. But as the saying goes, "if you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it", so in early 2020 we undertook a full audit of our carbon emissions and now offset them by 120%. That’s what being ‘climate positive’ means!

We know our products are out there doing good, but BCorp Certification is about much more than that, it’s an assessment of the overall positive impact of the company rather than a product or service. It asks; How do we operate behind the scenes? How do we treat our people? How genuinely do we care about our mission and how does that permeate through our operations? As well as making a positive contribution to the environment, are we also helping benefit society?

Being BCorp Certified means that our customers know we meet the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose. The BCorp certification process is a way of quantifying the process of constant improvement that we are making to the way we ‘do business’ and, importantly, zeroing in on the areas where we can do Better!

Sedex stands for Supplier Ethical Data Exchange and is a global membership organisation dedicated to driving improvements in ethical and responsible business practices in global supply chains. Better Packaging Co. is a proud Sedex Member.

Our comPOST Range meets a number of stringent tests for Compostability. The Australasian Standard, AS5810, is one of the toughest to achieve (they even check to make sure the products are non-toxic to worms!).

AS5810 certification numbers are ABAP 20036, ABAP 20049 and ABAM 20013. We are also active members of the Australasian Bioplastics Association, the organisation responsible for setting and upholding these standards.

The OK Home Compost Certification is another internationally recognised certification that many of our products carry. It is governed by TUV in Austria and most widely recognised throughout Europe.

The Seedling logo is internationally recognised as symbolising that a product will break down properly under commercial / industrial composting conditions. Only a few of our products have not been certified Home Compostable and carry this certification instead. Please check their product pages for more info as often we are confident that, if treated properly (e.g, our comPOSTubble Bags need their layers separated), then they will break down just fine in a home compost too.

The Ocean Bound Plastic Certification (OBP) guarantees the origin and traceability of the plastic pollution that we collect and recycle. It is plastic waste defined as “at risk of ending up in the ocean”. OBP is estimated to generate 80% of plastic marine litter.

OBP is an “Abandoned Plastic Waste” (microplastics, mezzo-plastics and macro-plastics), located within 50km from shores where waste management is inexistent or inefficient. When already located in a landfill or managed dump site, the plastic waste is not considered as OBP. However, when abandoned in an uncontrolled or informal dump site, this waste is considered as OBP.

The certification guarantees the respect of social, environmental, quality and traceability criteria:

• No child labour

• Fair working conditions

• Fair payments to the waste pickers

• Adequate waste management

• Having a quality management system

• Respect of OBP collection criteria from the first level of collection

• Traceability of OBP all along its journey

The Global Recycled Standard (GRS) is a voluntary product standard for tracking and verifying the content of recycled materials in a final product.

The standard supports companies looking to verify the recycled content of their products as well as responsible social, environmental and chemical practices in the production of these products.

The Quality management system of our manufacturers has been assessed and registered against the provisions of ISO9001:2015.

The Environment Management System of our suppliers for design, manufacture and sales has been assessed and registered against the provisions of ISO14001:2015

REACH is a European Regulation and stands for the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals. REACH makes it the responsibility of industry to assess and manage the risks posed by chemicals and to provide appropriate safety information for their users.

REACH aims to ensure high levels of protection for the health of humans and the environment.

RoHS stands for Restriction of Hazardous Substances. It is legislation that originated in the EU and restricts the use of several hazardous materials commonly found in electronic products.