A garden waste collection service is one step closer to being introduced in Dumfries and Galloway after residents expressed overwhelming support for such a scheme.
The council’s waste services team has been investigating the feasibility of a garden waste kerbside pick-up scheme and has been weighing up various options.
Twenty-six of Scotland’s 32 councils offer the service and Dumfries and Galloway is one of the few that hasn’t got on board yet.
A survey was carried out by the authority for three weeks this summer to gather feedback from the public about the possibility of garden waste collection.
The responses from 4,425 people showed that 92 percent wanted to receive collections of garden waste from their property.
Half of the respondents said they would want pick-ups on a fortnightly basis, while 44 per cent preferred collections every three weeks.
Council officers are now recommending that a stage two bid should be made to the government’s Recycling Improvement Fund to make the garden waste scheme a reality.
And councillors are due to discuss this suggestion and take a decision at next Tuesday’s communities committee.
A report produced for the meeting states: “The waste services team has undertaken an initial feasibility study on a garden waste collection service.
“This work has identified that there is a significant volume of garden waste within the region, and that if this material were captured in a kerbside recycling service, then it may yield approximately 7,000 tonnes per annum of garden waste.
“This material, if collected, is likely to divert an estimated 5,000 tonnes per annum from residual waste into the recycling stream, resulting in a step-change in our recycling rate of circa eight percentage points against our target (30.1 per cent current, 37.8 per cent forecast).
“As members will be aware, reducing residual waste and increasing recycling both have a significant impact on reducing the carbon footprint of the council’s services.”
The survey ran from July 21 until August 11 and the results show a strong desire for a garden waste collection service.
The council report claims that respondents accepted that there would be a charge to pay for the service, however the stats tell a different story.
Asked if they thought it would be reasonable for the council to charge for a garden collection waste service, only 368 people said yes (nine percent), while 1,718 said no (42 per cent). Meanwhile, 1,993 people (49 per cent) responded that they prefer free but would maybe pay.
Half of the people asked why they wouldn’t pay responded that the council should not charge for such a service, while 26 per cent said they didn’t feel they could afford it.
Twenty of the 26 councils collect on a fortnightly basis and 19 local authorities pick up garden waste all year round, while the other seven offer a seasonal service.
