Northamptonshire joint municipal waste management strategy


Recycling is an increasingly important issue in the UK. It is something we can all do in the hope of making a difference. The county of Northamptonshire, like many others, has introduced a strategy and action plan in the hope to manage the county’s waste in a more sustainable manor. The Northamptonshire joint municipal waste management strategy is a revision of the one introduced and adopted in 2002 and the aim is to ‘produce a joint approach to managing the county’s municipal solid waste in the period from 2007/8 to 2020/21.’

One part of the strategy was the recycling and composting performance. They hope that by 2020/21 50% of household waste will be recycled or composted. The recycling rates vary across the county with numerous borough and district councils having different times of residual refuse and varying recyclable and organic waste. By having restrictions on what people can and cannot recycle the different boroughs and district councils affect the percentage of household waste recycling rates in their area. For example in 2006/07 the Corby borough council had a household recycling rate of 28.0%. Corby’s details of recyclables were paper, plastic bottles and cans. Whereas Daventry district council had a recycling rate of 47.0% and its residents were able to recycle paper, plastic bottles cans and also glass and textiles. Daventry’s recyclable waste was also collected weekly unlike Corby’s which was collected fortnightly. It also appears that the councils that had a cardboard collection had a higher percentage of recycling rates compared to those who had no cardboard collection. So perhaps by making all districts have a cardboard collection we could further still improve the recycling rates of even more of the districts.

Recycling also depends on the individual. It is up to each household to decide how they will manage their recycling. We cannot force people to recycle efficiently just because we believe it is best for the environment. Some large families with lots of children may find it very difficult to watch what goes into the normal waste bin and what gets recycled. It can also be difficult for people to decide what should go where when it comes down to some of the plastics and cans. I know endless people that still do not realise that many juice cartons are not recyclable. Of course there will always be some people that do more recycling than others. For example in East Northamptonshire the annual recycling waste produced per person is 89kg compared with just 66kg in Corby.

However by looking at table 3 in the document we can see there has been a dramatic increase in household recycling rates across the whole of Northamptonshire since 2001/02. These vast improvements are being put down to new waste collection services, including the new garden waste collection and improvement of the overall recycling performance of the Household Waste Recycling Centre.

So far it is plain to see there has been great success across Northamptonshire with recycling rates increasing dramatically, but there is always room for improvement. Perhaps rather than just trying to teach people to recycle correctly, we should be thinking about trying to help them reduce their waste in the first place. This in turn will benefit the environment and help to reduce the costs of waste management. There are lots of people who throw away food still in its packaging because it has gone past its sell by date, but if people didn’t buy as much in the first place they would not be stuck in that position. So it is not just about what we can and can’t recycle but also about being sensible when it comes to buying products. By working together I see no reason why Northamptonshire cannot further improve its Household Waste Recycling Rates.