Changes to what is acceptable in Bega Valley Shire's FOGO bins mean there must be more thought and education about what happens to food packaging, says Bega-based ecologist Hugh Pitty.
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Designated compostable packaging and eating utensils will no longer be accepted in BVSC's FOGO bins, effective November 1.
The excluded products join other items that up until now have been permitted in the green-lid bins such as food-soiled paper, teabags and pet droppings.
"I understand the need and motivation to improve the product coming out of the FOGO stream because it has become contaminated to an unacceptable level," Mr Pitty said.
"If it is going to be a product going into the soil it needs to be cleaned up.
"But with the introduction of just organic material in FOGO bins, there needs to be more thought and education about what happens to the packaging."
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The sustainability of producing, transporting and the industrial composting of the specially designed packaging and eating utensils was "questionable" given the amount of energy and water consumed, he said.
"The challenge then is what happens to those products and what replaces that system."
Reuse, not recycle and compost
Mr Pitty led the 'green team' of volunteers that helped dramatically reduce the amount of landfill produced at last month's Wanderer Festival.
For festivals, "ultimately the answer is to move up to reusable crockery and cutlery" as he witnessed in 2008 at the National Sustainable Living Festival in Melbourne.
With the use of a portable trailer and a stock of reusable cutlery and crockery, eight volunteers washed the dirty items. Another four volunteers returned the clean items to the food vendors and collected dirty items from designated sites for washing.
Mr Pitty said a few councils in Victoria and Western Australia have adopted the model.
He approached council about introducing the "wash against waste" model "but they would prefer it be a community-based initiative so I have been liaising with organisations like the EPA", he said.
The "wash against waste" system effectively replaces all the single-use items at events with labour.
- Hugh Pitty
The model just requires a water supply and vendors paying a levy for "wash against waste" instead of buying single-use crockery and cutlery.
"At a festival the size of Wanderer you would need to pay volunteers, but that is a solution post-November 1," combined with people separating food material from containers, Mr Pitty said.
Zero waste
Mr Pitty said his favourite mentor Gerry Gillespie said "the only place that waste has truly existed is between humans' ears".
"We are on a planet of finite resources. If we have too much of one and not enough of another, we end up with pollution.
"Natural cycles don't have waste but inputs and outputs," Mr Pitty said.
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