Waste management plan

Introduction | Adopted plan | Draft central area section | About waste

About waste

Image of solid waste

The waste going to landfill from people living and working in Auckland city is enough to fill a rugby field to a height of five storeys more or less each month. And this doesn't include thousands more tonnes of building waste that goes to cleanfill. Auckland City Council has developed a waste management plan that focuses on reducing this waste.

Waste is largely regarded by those involved in its management as being tangible evidence that resources are not being used efficiently. Take the very simple example of a piece of paper. If only one side is printed on, only 50 per cent of capacity has been used. Gaining headway in waste reduction and resource efficiency is a constant challenge while it continues to be easy and cheap to throw things away.

This challenge has been recognised by central government in the provision of legislation for waste planning and, more recently, a national waste strategy which sets new goals requiring us 'to be smarter about environmental protection, social wellbeing and economic development'.

The aims are firstly to conserve resources and secondly, when we do use them, to use them efficiently.

This way of managing waste is now included in the Local Government Amendment Act 1996 under which councils are required to develop waste management plans.

Waste figures

• An estimated 380,000 tonnes* of solid waste is produced each year by Auckland City's households and businesses
• About two thirds to three quarters comes from businesses, and about a third to a quarter from households
• Nearly half of what is in the average household rubbish bin is organic (garden and kitchen waste)

This waste is disposed of to landfills either in Auckland or the Waikato.

Your role

Everyone creates waste; everyone has a role. New Zealand has signed international agreements which commit us to sustaining our resources and now it's Auckland City's turn to follow that through - to meet our needs while enabling future generations to meet theirs.

As waste producers, the solutions are in our hands. View more information about ways to reduce waste.

Reviewed March 2007