Reducing household waste
As the coverage of recycling systems is expanded, many local authorities are interested in programmes to prevent waste being presented for treatment. Since, on average, around half the household waste bin is made up of food and garden waste and packaging, WRAP has developed programmes in home composting, food waste reduction and packaging minimisation. It will be supporting activity on the other major categories in the future.
Home composting
Our home composting programme, run in partnership with local authorities in England and Scotland, is an effective and low cost way to reduce household waste. More than 1,700,000 compost bins have been supplied so far.
WRAP's successful home composting campaign works in partnership with local authorities to provide a complete service to deliver compost bins to householders and support them while they get the composting habit. The programme is supported by a team of Home Composting Advisers across England and Scotland.
Reducing packaging
Decisions about packaging design are made at a national or even European level. We are working with the retail sector to reduce the volume of packaging and food waste generated. Our first target is to halt the growth of packaging waste in the grocery sector by 2008. Thirty one major retailers, brands and suppliers have signed up to the Courtauld Commitment to help us achieve this target.
See how packaging is being reduced - Packaging presentation at LARAC 2007 (2162 kb) ![[pdf]](http://www.wrap.org.uk/display_images/document_icons/pdf.gif){kind=icon}
Household food waste
We run the Love Food Hate Waste campaign, a consumer facing campaign that aims to reduce the amount of household food waste we throw away. We are working in partnership with, among others, the Women's Institute in England, the UK grocery sector and food industry and the Scottish Waste Awareness Group.
There are brand guidelines, advertising and promotional materials at the Love Food Hate Waste partners website.
Carrier bags
In 2007 the retailers and WRAP reached an agreement with the governments in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to reduce the environmental impact of carrier bags by 25% by 2008.
