An environmental policy approach in which a producer’s responsibility for a product is extended to the waste stage of that product’s life cycle. In practice, EPR involves producers taking responsibility for the management of products after they become waste, including: collection; pre-treatment, e.g., sorting, dismantling or depollution; (preparation for) reuse; recovery (including recycling and energy recovery) or final disposal. EPR systems can allow producers to exercise their responsibility by providing the financial resources required and/or by taking over the operational aspects of the process from municipalities. They assume the responsibility voluntarily or mandatorily; EPR systems can be implemented individually or collectively. Source: Conference of the Parties to the Basel Convention, “Revised draft manuals on extended producer responsibility and financing systems for environmentally sound management,” document UNEP/CHW.14/5/Add.1, adopted in decision BC-14/3.* * This term and definition is included in the glossary of key terms prepared for the work of the intergovernmental negotiating committee to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment under the category 'Terms not used in Environment Assembly resolution 5/14 that may be related to those used in the resolution and that have definitions adopted or endorsed by an intergovernmental process'. See UNEP/PP/INC.1/6.