'The Birch Family are now in their 22nd Year in providing a collection service for waste farm plastics'.

In 1989, Peter & Marilyn Birch read an article in the Farmers Weekly regarding a new national scheme for free collection of waste silage film, crop film etc. from farms for recycling by British Polythene Industries (BPI) in Scotland. On contacting the company to have waste taken from their farm, Peter was told there was no collection agent in his area and was given the opportunity to meet with BPI to discuss becoming an agent. As a result of that meeting, P & M Birch became agents for the Glamorgan and Gwent area. In 1994, they were then offered the additional area of Dyfed (Carmarthenshire, Cardiganshire and Pembrokeshire) and in 1995 also took over the Powys area.
In 1995, due to the high cost of recycling this particular waste - due to high level of contamination, some manufacturers and importers of the silage film formed the Farm Rim Producers Group (FFPG) and introduced an Environmental Protection Contribution (EPC), payable by farmers on purchase of the polythene to help with the cost of collection and recycling of the material. As this was a voluntary scheme, some importers refused to join and flooded the market with non EPC polythene which meant that many farmers then went for the cheaper option. It was impossible to monitor which farmers had paid the EPC which meant that waste polythene was also being collected from non EPC customers. Determined to provide an environmentally friendly solution to dealing with the waste polythene, in 1996 FFPG declined to charge the EPC on their products and financed the collection and recycling schemes themselves. Government at this time was also preparing to make farm waste a Controlled Waste, under EC law, which meant that any future collection scheme would be underpinned by legislation - which would avoid further issues of any non-compliance operators.