Halloween pumpkins boost food waste recycling by more than 28 tonnes

The popularity of Swansea families carving pumpkins for Halloween has led to a huge increase in food waste recycling in the city.

Swansea Council has confirmed that following the annual, end of October celebration, recycling crews collected 28 tonnes more food waste from the kerbside and the bulk of it was made up of pumpkins.

Figures showed that in the week prior to Halloween, a total of 174 tonnes of food waste was collected from the kerb. A week later, following the celebrations, the figure rose to 203 tonnes.

David Hopkins, Cabinet Member for Environment and Transportation, said: “There was a noticeable increase of food waste collected immediately after Halloween and our collection crews have confirmed that they picked up a huge number of pumpkins.

“I’m pleased that residents have done the right thing and used the food waste recycling service to dispose of leftover food.

“Any time leftover food is disposed of in black bag waste it is then disposed of at landfill, and that is exactly what we are trying to avoid.

“Not only does it add to the amount of waste we are regularly disposing of at landfill, it creates harmful gases when it is rotting and this is not good for our local environment.”

The Council is continuing to encourage residents to use all the different kerbside recycling services to ensure the city meets the government recycling target of 58% by April this year.

Recycling officers are continuing their door-knocking campaign across the city, targeting neighbourhoods where there is a lower participation rate than other part of the city with recycling.

Cllr Hopkins added: “We are always looking at ways to increase participation and make sure we can provide help to households if they need advice about recycling more of their domestic waste.”

Residents can now download the Connect Swansea smartphone app which provides details of recycling in Swansea, along with when household collections take place.