Stratford-on-Avon District Council's new recycling service, when fully implemented from April 2009, will include a food composting service in your green bin.
Starting from next month (November) the green bin service will be temporarily suspended until April 2009. When the green bin service is re-introduced, residents will be able mix all food from bones, meat and fish to cooked and uncooked vegetables, grains and fruit with their garden waste and the combination will be collected and sent for composting.
"We are sorry for the short-term disruption of the green bin service; a service that was introduced in 2001 and one we know is valued throughout this rural district. It is hoped that residents will bear with us until April for this one-off,
5 month break in service," says Councillor Simon Jackson, Portfolio Holder for Environment.
"This was not an easy decision for the Council to make, but it was taken in the best interests of firstly: honoring our commitment to residents to maintain a weekly collection of food waste and secondly: rejecting the prospect of having to send the green waste to landfill pending the provision of a food and green waste composting facility in the Spring. To have sent green waste to landfill would have been to undermine the environmental principles the Council is trying to achieve.
"It is possible, for people who wish to, to compost your waste at home using compost bins or creating your own compost heap, or by using the Warwickshire County Council's household waste recycling centres. Bio-degradable waste constitutes around 60%* of all municipal waste around the country, currently this is all sent to landfill in Stratford District."
Please note that depending on when green bins are collected, last collections before the suspension will be either on the week commencing 20 October or 27 October.
Information about composting can be found at:
http://www.warwickshire.gov.uk/web/corporate/pages.nsf/(DisplayLinks)/C6E60D10B0D1E5A480256A4D004809CA
To find your local household waste recycling centres, visit: www.stratford.gov.uk/community/community-187.cfm
For more information about the new refuse and recycling service, visit:
www.stratford.gov.uk/community/community-111.cfm?source=promo
*www.foe.co.uk/resource/factsheets/eu_landfill_directive.pdf
