Ten thousand households across the Ballarat municipality will now be able to recycle their ‘scrunchable’ soft plastics as part of a new 12-month kerbside collection pilot program.

The City of Ballarat, in partnership with the Australia Food and Grocery Council, has launched a kerbside soft plastics recycling collection, enabling residents to recycle their soft plastics in a City of Ballarat-supplied orange bag that can now be placed in residents’ yellow-lid recycling bin.

The soft plastics that residents recycle will be included in a circular solution to turn them back into quality products or packaging, as part of plans to develop a long-term circular system for soft plastic packaging waste.

Soft plastics can only be recycled in the supplied orange bags and should be empty and dry. The orange bags are made in Australia from 100 per cent recycled plastic.

Scrunchable soft plastics include bread and cereal bags, frozen vegetable packets, lolly wrappers, bubble and cling wrap as well as plastic toilet paper wrap. You can also look for the former REDCycle logo or the Australian Recycling Label ‘Return to Store’ or ‘In-store Drop-off’ logo.

The supplied orange bags can contain up to 1kg of soft plastics. When the orange bag is full and tight like a basketball, residents can secure it with a double knot and place it in their fortnightly yellow-lid recyclables collection bin.

City of Ballarat Mayor, Cr Des Hudson said it is exciting to provide residents with a way to recycle soft plastics while also freeing up space in residents’ general waste bins.

“During community consultation for the Kerbside Transition Plan last year, many residents told us they wanted a solution for their soft plastic waste,” he said.

“Recycling soft plastics allows them to be sorted, processed and ultimately transformed back into new packaging or other products, keeps them out of landfill and gives them a new life.

“The City of Ballarat is committed to reducing waste going to landfill and creating a circular economy, that keeps materials in use for as long as possible.

“The pilot project will help inform the design of a large-scale soft plastics kerbside collection and sorting of soft plastics which will help the development of a sustainable advanced recycling industry in Australia.”

Australian Food and Grocery Council Director Sustainability Barry Cosier said the organisation had been working with many companies and all levels of government on a solution for soft plastics.  

“While soft plastics are useful for packaging everything from peas to bread, parcels and garden mulch, we need large quantities to be efficiently collected to instill confidence to invest in recycling and to re-manufacture it into product and packaging again,” he said.

Environmental Evolution Director Julie White, an environmental consultant who works with community groups to improve their environmental impact, said people often ask her what they can do with their stockpile of plastics.

“Well Ballarat – we now have a solution! Get ready to pull out your soft plastics and participate in this awesome initiative,” she said.

Macedon Ranges residents are now being encouraged to join an expanded shire-wide kerbside soft plastics recycling pilot, following an encouraging earlier trial in Romsey.

As of this week households can now register in-person at a council customer service centre to get a free pack of 20 bags. Households can conveniently recycle soft plastics by filling these special orange collection bags and, when full, placing them into the yellow-lidded recycling bin for collection. 

The pilot program is an expansion of an initial 12-month trial in Romsey and is part of the development of a proposed national pilot program led by the Australian Food and Grocery Council (AFGC) in conjunction with over 40 household brands.

Mayor Annette Death said the council’s ongoing involvement in supporting recycling alternatives for soft plastics reflected resident feedback and interest in the former RedCycle program.

“We are confident this pilot program will be used by even more households, given the convenience of using a special bag in their own bin,” she said.

“We welcome this initiative by the AFGC and are excited to continue this pilot partnership in our shire. Soft plastics are currently a big part of our waste to landfill and cannot be efficiently collected for recycling in any other way.

“We hope that this expanded pilot benefits our residents and helps inform the next important phase of this scheme. It is important that many more households are able to recycle soft plastic into products made here in Australia.” 

AFGC Director of Sustainability, Barry Cosier, said the expanded pilot was the next step for industry and governments to collaborate in designing a product stewardship scheme in Australia.

“We have been working with many companies and all levels of government on a solution for soft plastics,” Mr Cosier said.

“While soft plastics are useful for packaging everything from peas to bread, to parcels and garden mulch, we need large quantities to be efficiently collected to instil confidence to invest in recycling and to remanufacture it into recycled products and packaging again.”  

The Romsey-based trial selected just over 2,200 residents to participate, with a massive 1737 kilograms of soft plastic that would have otherwise gone to landfill recycled.

Work is also underway to better understand which households choose to recycle, and the benefits of different collection methods, while brands continue to work towards the development of a proposed product stewardship scheme.