Extended producer responsibility (EPR) is defined by the OECD1 as an environmental policy approach in which a producer’s responsibility, physical and/or financial, for a product is extended to the postconsumer stage of the product’s life cycle. Under EPR, legal rules make producers (brand owners, manufacturers and first importers) responsible for achieving environmental outcomes3 associated with the end-of-life management of wastes from products and packaging they supply into the marketplace and for adhering to administrative rules so that those environmental outcomes can be verified. The legal rules related to EPR may be supplemented by other rules that govern service providers to ensure the environmental outcomes sought under EPR. Service providers may include producer responsibility organizations (PROs) providing administrative compliance services or companies providing material collection, reuse or recycling, transport and marketing services (collectively ‘service providers’). Together, the design of the rules and the oversight mechanisms to ensure adherence to the rules determine whether the environmental outcomes will be achieved.