The Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI), Dalton, Ga., is among a national coalition of organizations
that have founded the Product Management Alliance (PMA), an inter-industry partnership launched to
support voluntary market-based solutions for product stewardship. The PMA — whose founding members
represent the carpet, mattress, electronics, toy, paper, packaging and transportation materials,
plastics, personal goods and pharmaceutical industries — states it “will work to address its
members’ concerns relating to government policies that mandate extended producer responsibility and
programs that shift the costs of product collection solely to the manufacturer and will work with
experts in industry and government in order to ensure a consistent policy for recovery, take-back
programs and other extended producer responsibility models.”
California’s AB 2398 Carpet Stewardship Bill — the first extended producer responsibility
legislation in the United States to specifically address carpet, as well as the first to regulate a
non-hazardous product — became effective July 1, 2011. AB 2398 offers financial incentives for
carpet recycling with funds collected through a 5-cents-per-square-yard assessment on all carpet
sold or shipped into California. Several states including Massachusetts and Rhode Island have
presented similar bills that are either pending or under consideration.
CRI Government Relations Director and PMA Treasurer Jennifer Mendez says she expects to see
additional bills, as well as broad-based framework legislation addressing multiple industries and
product classes, proposed during the 2012 state legislature sessions. “It’s important for the
carpet and other industries to join forces and have our voices heard on the vital issue of end-of
life management for products before governments pass more mandates,” Mendez said. “Business models
for product recovery need to work for all the parties involved, for the sake of our economy as well
as the environment.”
October 4, 2011
