GREATER Manchester is marking Recycle Week (17-23 October) with a call to get real on the fundamentals of recycling, with advice on how everyone can help cut down on waste and prevent harmful emissions in the city-region.
Now in its eighteenth year, Recycle Week is the nation’s biggest annual celebration of recycling. This Recycle Week, Recycle for Greater Manchester (R4GM) and Recycle Now are getting real about where we are, where we want to be, and how we’re all going to get there together.
Residents have more questions than ever about their recycling, and R4GM will be supporting Recycle Now by giving people real answers throughout Recycle Week and beyond.
This year’s national campaign will focus on three common questions that many of us have when it comes to recycling:
Does my recycling really make a difference?
One item in the bin can’t hurt, can it?
Recycling is so confusing, Isn’t it?
Recycle Now will be providing recycling information and insights to answer these questions, and demonstrating that by recycling properly we really can make a difference. In fact, recycling in the UK saves 18 million tonnes of CO2 a year, which in turns helps to reduce the harmful greenhouse gas emissions which lead to climate change.
One wrong item in the recycling bin from each of us can make whole lorry loads unrecyclable. Recycling doesn’t have to be confusing, and residents can visit www.recycleforgreatermanchester.com to find out which items can be recycled and where. Some items can be recycled in weekly kerbside collections, while others may need to be taken to one of our Household Waste Recycling Centres.
Greater Manchester is a region of recyclers, with recycling rates at our 20 household waste and recycling centres rising to 53% between April and June this year, up more than 2% compared to the same period last year. There are some simple things that we can all do to make our recycling even better:
Only put clean paper, cardboard and tetrapak cartons in your paper and card bin. Nappies, tissues and kitchen roll go in your general waste bin, and would contaminate paper and card recycling – making the whole load unrecyclable.
Plastic bottles, glass bottles glass jars, drinks cans, aerosols and aluminium foil go into the mixed recycling bin.
Plastic pots, tubs and trays go in your general waste bin and not your mixed recycling bin.
Please only put food and garden waste in your food and garden bin. This includes eggshells, teabags, and animal bones.
Craig Stephens, Campaign Manager for Recycle Now, said:
By recycling even better we can have a big impact on our environment. In Greater Manchester it’s no different – more and more people are recycling, so the next step is to make sure we get our recycling right. So come on, Greater Manchester, keep up the great work and let’s make our recycling better than ever before!
Cllr Martyn Cox, GMCA lead for the Green City-Region and waste and recycling, said:
Once again we’re proud to be supporting #RecycleWeek 2022 in Greater Manchester. We’ve made a lot of progress with our recycling rates in recent years – we collect over 40 different types of materials, and added new containers at household waste recycling centres to collect hard plastics.
However, even though lots of us are recycling right, our crews across the city-region are still finding lots of items placed in the wrong bins. This contamination is time-consuming, expensive, and can even mean entire wagon-loads of recycling have to be treated as general waste rather than be recycled into something new.
This #RecycleWeek, why not take a second and brush up on your recycling knowledge. Before you put your item in your recycling bin, double check your local council website or calendar and make sure you’re not accidentally contaminating your recycling. It’s quick, easy, and could be the difference that means a whole wagon-load of items gets recycled properly.
To find out more about Recycle Week visit www.recyclenow.org.uk/
