Food

Landfilled organics result to significant GHG emissions and a waste of valuable nutrients. Banning the landfilling of household and commercial food and garden waste would stimulate jobs growth, divert millions of tonnes from landfill, generate compost, sequester carbon in soils and reduce Australia's GHG footprint.

The NSW DPIE conducted an excellent review of FOGO performance across 34 Councils in NSW. Average performance is a poor indicator of the trends in FOGO so Mike Ritchie, re-analysed the data to look at individual Council performance and summarised his findings in an informative article.

The WA Waste Authority is providing $20m to local governments over the next 6 years to implement a three-bin FOGO kerbside service.

Organics to landfill make up more than half of all waste to landfill in Australia. They are also responsible for a fair amount of the waste sector's GHG emissions. How can we create environmental benefits and stimulate the economic growth sorely needed post COVID-19?

If global food waste was a country, it would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, behind the U.S. and China One thing we can do to combat climate change as individuals, households, local councils, state governments and federal governments is address food waste to landfill. So, what are our options?

The recently awarded WLRM grants wrap up a spectacular year for MRA's grants team. Over the four funding streams MRA helped our clients win over $11 million in grants for FOGO and infrastructure projects.

One billion single use coffee cups are sent to landfill every year. Sounds like a lot but this represents less than 0.0004% of the waste generated in Australia per year. So, what can we do to deal with coffee cups so that we can focus on significant streams like organics (particularly food), which represent around 50% of all waste to landfill in Australia?

Vegetable growers across Australia must comply with strict requirements to ensure the food they produce is safe for consumers. Farmers purchasing compost should be asking their supplier for a proof of compliance.

The International Compost Awareness Week (ICAW), celebrated every year during the first full week of May, represents a great opportunity for joining compost related workshops, seminars and activities. Abroad and in Australia, the compost industry and enthusiasts rev up the efforts to increase awareness of the importance of compost and to promote the use of compost and related products.

FOGO diversion from landfill is one of the cheapest global warming abatement options. It is also relatively easy to do and should be prioritised by Government.

MRA's Mike Ritchie was very pleased to have been invited to contribute to the Environmental Professionals Forum's (EPF) UnEaten Matters evening on the 8th of August. Mike moderated a panel of professionals to discuss the complexities of food waste.

At a recent meeting with Local Government Mayors and CEO’s, a claim was made that transporting organics by truck to a distant compost facility (in this case 150km away) would emit more greenhouse gases than landfilling it locally. Thinking that the carbon forcing factor of methane from landfill (25 times CO2) would render that claim incorrect, I thought I should go back and check the maths.