This item was published during the term of a previous administration that ended in April 2007
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Isle of Arran recycling scheme
07/06/2006
More than £2 million has been awarded to North Ayrshire Council from the Strategic Waste Fund to implement a new kerbside recycling scheme on the Isle of Arran.
The new recycling service is designed to make it as easy as possible for people to recycle through the use of a fortnightly collection of recyclable materials and fortnightly collection of residual waste.
Environment Minister Ross Finnie said:
"The Isle of Arran has a permanent population of around 5,000 with an estimated annual influx of some 230,000 tourists. The implementation of this scheme further demonstrates the commitment of Scotland to improve its recycling performance and lead by example.
"We all produce waste and we all have a responsibility for it. In the past it has been all too easy to send our rubbish to landfill. We now have to start looking at alternatives.
"I hope that Arran will discover, as many communities in Scotland already have, that recycling has lots of benefits. It can save money and prevent useful materials being wasted while protecting our environment. In addition to the financial and environmental benefits, recycling also creates jobs."
Waste Aware North Ayrshire is a joint initiative between the Executive, North Ayrshire Council, Scottish Waste Awareness Group. It asks all householders to Reduce, Re-use and Recycle their waste.
The kerbside recycling scheme will see blue recycle bins provided to 3,100 households by next year. It is estimated that the scheme will remove 1,300 tonnes of Municipal Solid Waste from landfill. WRAP have also distributed 2,617 home composting bins in Arran last year as part of our Home Composting programme. We were very encouraged by the interest in the bins.
The Scottish Waste Awareness Group (SWAG) is a Scotland wide initiative aimed at the general public to raise the awareness of waste issues.
The Strategic Waste Fund has £230 million available for local authorities to achieve the National recycling and composting target of 30 per cent of municipal solid waste by 2008. The award of £2.2 million was made to North Ayrshire Council in February 2006.