Is it fair to blame Coca-Cola and big corporations for our waste crisis?

Some global corporations are trying to address the environmental impact of throwaway culture, but campaigners say they remain part of the problem

When John Sauven, executive director at Greenpeace UK, heard a woman complain on the radio that supermarket croissants were cheaper to buy wrapped in plastic than paper, he was so startled he went straight to his local Co-op

"It was true," Sauven said at a recent Guardian roundtable discussion on the future of waste. "If I bought two croissants in a brown paper bag, it was 79p [each], and if I bought them in a big plastic container it was 63p [each]. And I just thought ... this is a complete failure of the system."