Page 559 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 21 February 2018
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timetable for the full rollout. It gives the industry time to work out how it should respond. This rollout is staged until mid-2019, which also should help some businesses. I am pleased that both the government’s amendment today and the response to Mr Wall’s question during question time yesterday indicate that the government is working on other transitional help.
I would now like to move on to where we think we need to move the green waste service over time. In the big picture the Greens want to see a waste management system that reduces the waste going to landfill and heads towards a zero-waste model. So, to be clear, in the long run the Greens would like to see less and less need for a green waste service, whoever provides it. The Greens have always been clear that we would like to see zero waste, so from that point of view we have always been clear that this is a business that we would like to, over time, see less of. We make no apology for that.
The ACT’s resource recovery rate sits currently at 60 per cent, with about 40 per cent of our waste still ending up in landfill. The government have set a goal of recovering 90 per cent of our waste by 2025. We believe that this can be achieved, but not if we simply continue on our current path. We know that many of the waste streams that currently go to landfill could be recycled or reused. We know that high recycling rates would create sustainable waste industry jobs. Waste should be treated as a potentially valuable resource.
Waste also impacts on our policy of becoming a carbon neutral system. We are leading the nation with our investment in renewables, but in order to create a carbon neutral society we need to have a similar focus on reducing emissions from other sectors, including the waste sector. Most of the emissions that are produced from landfill come from organic waste, so efforts to divert garden waste from landfill are important.
But garden waste is only a part of the organic waste stream. Organic waste, including green waste and food waste, is potentially one of the most economically important parts of our waste stream. As Ms Fitzharris said, what is happening at present with the green waste is that it is being turned into high quality compost and being sold both within the ACT and outside the ACT. I understand that Corkhill’s compost is one of the few material businesses we have which export from the ACT. From that point of view, that is a very positive thing.
What I would like to talk about now is food organics. Once sent to landfill, food waste is a major emissions generator, but it has huge potential as a resource. It is made of high quality organic materials which can be used to enrich soil, with excellent environmental benefits. The benefits include the ability of enriched soil to sequester carbon. This is really important for combating climate change.
Last night I went to a lecture about ways to draw down carbon from the atmosphere, which is what we are going to need to do if we want to reduce climate change impacts. Improved soil facility and agricultural practices that put carbon back into soil are part of the solution. Better utilising food waste also can lead to the replacement of
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