Kidlington comes online
Food waste collection extended to include Kidlington
Kidlington’s food waste collections start next week after it joined the Cherwell District Council scheme, part funded by Oxfordshire Waste Partnership (OWP), in November 2009. Homes will already have received their kitchen caddies, information packs and a complimentary roll of compostable caddy liners. All food waste, cooked or uncooked, should now be put into the brown bin. The kitchen caddy will help residents transfer food waste from their kitchen to the brown bin.
Councillor George Reynolds, Cherwell’s portfolio holder for environment, health and recreation, said: “We’re delighted to welcome Kidlington onto the scheme and are optimistic about what will be achieved here. Residents across the district have an excellent track record for recycling and we have no reason to suspect the response to food waste will be any different.”
Villages across the north of Cherwell have already had collections and early results show that homes are recycling about half of their food waste. Once everyone becomes accustomed to the switch, this figure is expected to rise meaning less food going to landfill, which is not only harmful to the environment but also costly to the taxpayer. Kidlington is the only village in the south of the district to have joined the scheme - the others will do so in the new year, along with Banbury and Bicester. About 12,000 tonnes of food waste goes to landfill each year in Cherwell but the initiative should cut this back by 4,000 tonnes next year and 5,000 in 2011/12.
If there is any uncertainty about what can now go in the brown bin, residents should refer to the fridge magnet they received with their caddy. This is by no means exclusive but gives a good indication.
OWP communications officer, Paul Mocroft, said: "We were out with Cherwell's recycling team this week at the Kidlington Christmas light event. It was great to hear so many excited people talking about their new food waste caddies. We hope they all embrace the new scheme as much as other Cherwell residents have."
Cherwell staff will be at Kidlington market from 10am to 4pm on Saturday, 12 December, to answer any food waste questions shoppers might have. A growing list of retailers sell the compostable caddy liners, including three in Kidlington - Co-op in High Street, Sainsbury’s in Oxford Road and Tesco in High Street. The liners are not compulsory; caddies can be lined with newspaper or left unlined instead. Visit www.cherwell.gov.uk/foodwaste for plenty more detail on the scheme.
