Households urged to recycle more than just kitchen waste

IRISH households are being urged to look beyond the kitchen for reusable waste as a new study reveals half of the population are not regularly recycling rubbish found in the rest of the house.

Ireland’s recycling rate needs to increase by 15%, which is equivalent to two extra green bins per household, according to Repak.

The industry-funded organisation set up to facilitate and increase packaging recycling found only 45% of households regularly recycled packaging from the bathroom.

It found 50% of households are not recycling aerosol cans, while over a third are not recycling plastic detergent and shampoo bottles.

Some of the most forgotten items that can be recycled are sweet or biscuit tins, foil trays from takeaways and cake and tart holders.

And just 55% of adults recycle steel food cans.

Those renting are less likely to recycle, with an average claimed recycling rate of 42%, compared with 53% for homeowners.

The study also found apartment dwellers are less likely to use bottle banks and recycling centres.

Repak wants householders and businesses to recycle more used packaging to help reach the 750,000 tonnes target by the end of the year — an increase of 100,000 tonnes on last year’s total.

Repak chief executive, Andrew Hethering, said recycling in the home was now very convenient with more than 1.1 million households having direct access to a dry recyclable [green bin] collection.

“So we want to encourage people to scour each room in the house and check what additional packaging items they are not recycling that can be recycled,” he said.

Meanwhile, the 2007 National Litter Pollution Monitoring System, published yesterday, reveals that areas of the country either litter free, or slightly littered, had increased from 60.4% in 2006 to 63.6% in 2007.

The main offenders were cigarette-related litter (47%), food-related litter (28%) and packaging litter (12%)

Passing pedestrians (35.5%); passing motorists (17.8%), retail outlets (11.6%), gathering points (6.6%) and fast food outlets (6.4%) were the main causes of litter nationally.

The litter report, based on an analysis of data received from 75 local authorities, found that chewing gum accounted for more than a quarter of all litter recorded last year, compared to sweet wrappers, crisp bags, lollipop sticks and straws that made up 7% of the total.

Environment Minister John Gormley said enforcement was key to achieving a greater improvement in Ireland’s litter levels.

He has written to the Garda Commissioner urging greater police involvement in this area and has also invited suggestions from the head of the courts service to make the enforcement of existing litter legislation more effective.

Mr Gormley also wants county and city managers to take steps to achieve greater payment and conviction rates.

“Enforcement levels, while improving each year, remain lower than I would wish,” he said.