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Our Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy 2024-2034 was adopted by Council on Monday 12 August 2024. This strategy will serve to guide us for the next 10 years in our efforts to reduce waste.
View our adopted Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy 2024-2034
We would like to thank you for your feedback and participation in building our Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy 2024-2034.
Between May – July we invited everyone in the local government area with an interest in waste to join the conversation. We provided opportunities for a range of voices to be heard through conversations, workshops, drop-in sessions, pop-up events, surveys and social media. This was a conversation that heard from our community’s diverse voices, including our local residents, community representative groups, Aboriginal community, local businesses and waste and circular economy leaders.
In the month since its adoption, we have been working behind the scenes to action things that were important to the community.
Soft plastics drop-off event
Soft plastics recycling was a highly mentioned topic the community wanted a solution for. We are currently working on a soft plastics drop-off event which will occur later this year. More details will be announced soon, but in the meantime, we encourage you to start saving your soft plastics for this drop off event.
For more waste information
To stay up to date with what is happening in waste, you can visit the Wollongong Waste website or download the Wollongong Waste App from the App Store for Apple devices or Google Play for Android devices. The free Wollongong Waste App is your one-stop for up-to-date information on Council’s FOGO, recycling, waste services and events. It’s also where you can go to see your bin days, book a household clean-up or request a red-lid bin size downgrade (a great option to save money).
Thank you again for your involvement in creating our Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy. We look forward to delivering on this now for our community.
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Thank you to everyone who recently participated in our second phase of engagement with the community on the topic of waste. Here’s a summary of what we heard in Phase 2 during the Exhibition of the Draft Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy 2024-2034:
Engagement Summary
Following the Council meeting on Monday 24 June, the Draft Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy was put on exhibition from 25 June – 23 July 2024.
Engagement heard from almost 200 voices during Phase 2 - a combination of local residents, experts in waste, businesses in the waste industry, previous participants, commercial businesses, Aboriginal community and more.
The themes that emerged from the exhibition period have been summarised as:
What people liked
- Thinking about waste management in the future for the region
- Reducing waste going to landfill
- Exploring solutions for soft plastics recycling
- Expanding recycling solutions
- Increasing education
- Address illegal dumping
- Targeting polystyrene
- Increasing FOGO uptake
- Investigating a North Illawarra waste disposal option
- Transitioning to a circular economy, particularly with the idea of repair/circular economy hubs.
What people didn’t like
- Moving for a fortnightly red-lid bin service without prior consultation or ability to opt-in
- Current recycling solutions – domestic collection, public recycling bin availability, accessibility to Whytes Gully as only tip option
- Increasing costs
- Lack of soft plastic recycling or polystyrene solution in region
- Continued increase of waste (eg. packaging, commercial waste, textiles) ending up in waste stream and going to landfill.
- Community engagement approach to build Draft Strategy.
Things to consider
- Future consultation on red-lid bin changes so there are not adverse negative consequences/risks for households unable to move to fortnightly service (large families, children in nappies etc.)
- More effective recycling solutions for domestic services (eg. weekly recycling service).
- Increase recycling options for problem waste eg. nappies, textiles, glass, e-waste, bulky items for kerbside collection
- Education that is tailored to what community wants and needs
- Reducing and enforcement on illegal dumping
- Future possibility of energy generation from waste
- Expanding engagement strategy for community on the topic of waste
- Evaluating costs of landfilling in a cost of living crisis
- Incentivising effective waste management in the community
- Creating a summarised version of the draft strategy for improved readability.
Next Steps
Council has now considered all the feedback over the exhibition period and made adjustments as necessary to the draft before the final Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy 2024-2034 will be put before Council next Monday evening., the 12 August.
You can find the final version of the Waste and Resource Recovery Strategy 2024-2034 attached that is part of the Council Business Paper for the 12 August meeting. Councillors will evaluate the final Strategy and decide whether to endorse it for adoption.
If you would like to watch the Council meeting, you can watch all Council Meetings online via our webcast, or to watch in person, seats in the public gallery are available from 5.45pm. Note that if you're attending in-person, you must follow the Public Gallery Conduct Standards.