Enough recyclable waste to fill a medium size cruise ship was dumped in Hawke’s Bay landfills in one year. Graphic / NZME
Enough recyclable waste to fill a medium size cruise ship was dumped in Hawke’s Bay landfills in one year. Graphic / NZME
Envision a medium-sized cruise ship at Napier Port brimming with plastics and glass.
That’s how much was dumped in Hawke’s Bay’s landfill in a year, when it could just have been recycled.
Amazingly, it’s not even the biggest issue when it comes to waste in the Bay at the moment. Napier City councillor Hayley Browne says organics in landfill is still the biggest challenge.
“Food waste is a particular issue, making up a heartbreaking 41% of what’s collected from household wheelie bins,” Browne said.
“Organics aren’t just food waste – they include paper, timber, clothing made from natural fibres (not polyester), and garden waste as well.”
Napier City and Hastings District have adopted the Draft Joint Waste Management and Minimisation Plan, which aims to ensure the councils meet requirements and communities have a clear path of action for waste over the next six years.
As part of the draft plan the councils have been examining locals' rubbish to see what they and the community can do better.
They found 58% of items in the typical rubbish bin could have been recycled (12% of contents) or composted (46%).
The plan said more than 17,000 tonnes of rubbish going directly to Ōmarunui Landfill or via the transfer stations could have been recycled, composted, or recovered using available facilities.
“Another 5000 tonnes from our kerbside rubbish bins could have been diverted away from the landfill.”
It said Hawke’s Bay residents produced 596kg of waste per capita (per person) every year.
This was an average across waste produced by all businesses, hospitals, households, retirement villages, schools, and so on. The national average is 669kg per person.
Browne said the councils wanted to hear from the community about what would help them reduce food waste.
In 2022 Labour promised to turn around New Zealand’s record on waste, by transforming recycling, including a nationwide food scrap collection.
Napier’s Long-Term Plan budgeted $500,000-$2 million in 2026/27 for the “rollout of a mandatory kerbside food scraps collection”.
However, National scrubbed the scheme.
Browne said the draft waste plan did not specifically talk about collecting food scraps.
Napier City councillor Hayley Browne says food waste makes up 41% of what’s collected from household wheelie bins.
Staff had previously looked into the practicalities of rolling out a service in Napier and Hastings and found a mixed response.
“It’s tricky to know if kerbside collection would make a difference. We’ve seen in other cities that participation starts okay but then drops off, with only about 20%-30% of people using it over time,” she said.
Running the collection trucks was expensive and there were “obvious issues” with keeping food scraps in a bin for a week, especially in summer.
Some residents used worm farms, compost, or bokashi to process food scraps at home, or paid for private green waste collections.
“Some neighbours have come together to tackle food waste on a hyper-local scale, setting up shared compost bins, neighbourhood chickens and pigs (in the more rural areas), and even community worm farms.
“Others are swapping excess produce through local food-sharing groups or dropping scraps to friends with hungry animals. There’s plenty of creative, grassroots solutions out there – we’d love to help more people find what works for them,” Browne said.
How much managing waste costs
In the 2023/24 financial year, the total cost of the councils’ waste management and minimisation services was more than $50m ($19m for Napier and $34m for Hastings).
The costs were largely covered by landfill and transfer stations user fees or targeted rates for kerbside services and recycling depots.
Waste levy funds received from central government assist with many other functions including grants, education and some staffing costs.
Any new actions in this draft plan can only be delivered if the councils can access enough funding and resources. The estimated cost of proposed new actions in this plan is $2.1m per year across both councils. This will be funded through existing budgets and increased waste levy revenue.
Napier City Council spent $43,000 on cleaning up illegal dumping last year.
Billions of drink bottles dumped
The Government’s newly released waste and resource efficiency strategy includes some confronting facts.
In 2021/22, people in New Zealand used over 2.5 billion single-use drink containers each year – nearly 500 per Kiwi every year. More than half of these empty containers end up in landfills, unused stockpiles, and as litter
In 2022, the waste sector contributed about 4.5% of New Zealand’s total greenhouse gas emissions, and 8.5% of biogenic methane emissions. Most waste emissions are caused by the breakdown of organic materials in landfills
Aussies do a better job
New Zealand’s recycling rate is 39%
Australia’s equivalent rate is 63%.
LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.
