The United Kingdom was recently listed near the bottom of the list of countries in Europe when it comes to recycling and waste management. Currently the UK is behind many of its own recycling and landfill objectives and most think they will also fail to meet the standards outlined by the European Union. The EU laid out specific guidelines for all of its members countries to reduce the size of their landfills over periods of five, ten, and twenty years. A recent announcement by Hilary Benn revealed new policy which is meant to speed up the process of getting the United Kingdom on track towards its recycling goals.
The new campaign, which was launched by the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs, asks customers in the United Kingdom to re-think their approach when it comes to waste management. The new campaign revisits the three R’s of Recycle, Reuse, Reduce, and asks consumes to take innovative approaches on everything from recycled furniture, which may be used to create electricity, all the way to food waste, which can also be used to generate electricity. Benn made the announcement at a London waste summit earlier this month.
The eight hundred thousand pound campaign is part of what Benn is calling his zero waste policy, which aims to reduce the amount of waste Britain sends to landfills to zero. Currently the United Kingdom sends more than half of its rubbish to landfills; however countries like Germany and Sweden have been able to use innovative approaches to reduce their landfill input to under two percent. Benn feels zero waste is a legitimate standard for Britain.
|
|
