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The price of rubbish bags does not seem to be the reason for people putting rubbish in the recycling.
In an attempt to stop people putting rubbish in recycling bins or dumping it illegally, the Palmerston North City Council ran an experiment to see whether the cost of rubbish bags was the problem.
People on low incomes were invited to pick up four free rubbish bags to use during a trial that started in April, and more than 1000 households took up the offer.
But it made no difference.
Council group manager for property and resource recovery Bryce Hosking there was no tangible decrease in contamination, from soft plastics to dirty nappies, put out in the recycling bins.
The amount of rubbish in the recycling bins remained stubbornly high around 20%, well above the council’s goal of 10-12%.
“There is little correlation between the amount of contamination and the number of rubbish bags placed out for collection.”
There was also no measurable decrease in the number of reported incidents of illegal dumping.
The trial suggested something other than the price of rubbish bags was influencing people to do the wrong thing with their rubbish.
Hosking said some of the problems could be related to language barriers, people not understanding what could or could not go in the recycling bin, and not enough enforcement of the rules.
City councillor Lorna Johnson, who had been an advocate for the trial, said the fact that eliminating the cost of rubbish disposal had not made a difference should give the council confidence to hold people accountable for doing the wrong thing.
Hosking said councillors would be asked to support a budget for extra efforts to inspect recycling bins and impose penalties for non-compliance.
There would also be a programme of public education to make sure people got the correct messages about what could be recycled.
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The amount of food waste rescued from the general rubbish stream has surprised the Palmerston North City Council and trial participants.
While the rubbish bag trial was a flop, a trial of kerbside food scrap collections was a success, with 16 tonnes of food that would otherwise have gone to landfill rescued for composting.
However, that service was unlikely to be rolled out across the whole city until 2027/28, ahead of the government-imposed deadline of January 2030.
Resource recovery and sustainability activities manager Natasha Hickmott said the amount of food waste collected during the trial was able to be absorbed into the council’s composting processes at Awapuni.
But the council did not have access to a plant capable of processing the amount of food waste that would be collected across the whole city, nor did it have enough trucks and drivers.
Sustainability committee chairman Brent Barrett said it was disappointing the community could be waiting several years for a food waste collection service.
He was also keen to encourage home or neighbourhood composting, as that was what some households preferred to having their food waste collected and taken away to be dealt with.
“We have at least four years and there are opportunities to improve composting during that time.”
Hickmott said there was a possibility that increasing the diversion of food waste from landfill now could make it difficult to meet Ministry for the Environment targets that would be set later.
It would be harder to make improvements if the council increased diversion before a baseline was set.
Cr Kaydee Zabelin said the more important thing was to reduce waste now, and if the Government measures discouraged that, there was a serious flaw in the process.
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