Armed
with fresh learnings from the Mangere Bridge car boot sale, the WasteWise group
got in early with the Waterlea Summer Festival planning to assist with the
reduction of waste at this popular community event. Janine met with PTA Chairperson Nina Crowe
well before the day to provide advice about the types of compostable or
recyclable packaging that could be used and where to source this. The group researched how to deal with
particularly tricky items of waste generated by the event, including the masses
of food-contaminated tinfoil that is left over after the hangi. The team were hugely impressed with the
commitment shown by Nina and the PTA to reducing waste at the festival and
their support for our early involvement.
This
event taught us a key lesson, as we had underestimated the volume of waste
generated in the preparation for the festival. A spot check of rubbish bags at
the hangi prep alone enabled Janine and Meredith to “rescue” nine rubbish sacks
full of compostable items, soft plastics and recyclables! Next time we will encourage groups hosting a
large community event to assign a waste co-ordinator to communicate the
WasteWise message to everyone involved during the preparation stage, as well as
at the event itself.
On the evening
of the festival, the WasteWise team set up two rubbish stations, consisting of
a recycle bin, compost bin, used tinfoil bin and landfill bin. These bins were once again supplied and
donated by Steve Rickerby of We Compost,
to whom we are most grateful! A wash
station was set up next to the bins so people could rinse any recyclable items
before binning. Our WasteWise team
monitored the stations, enabling us to guide festival-goers in sorting their
rubbish if needed. People were generally
co-operative and interested in what we were doing and some were very supportive
of the move to a more environmentally-friendly approach to managing waste at
community events. Once again, it was
often the children who were particularly open and knowledgeable about what to
do with their rubbish.
At the
close of the festival, which hosted around 1500 people, we were left with two
full recycle bins, two full compost bins, a large box of cardboard and only three
bags of rubbish destined for landfill!
“It was so fantastic having help with waste,” Nina (PTA) said to our
WasteWise volunteers after the event. “Thank you so much! I know last year we
paid a few hundred for a skip. This year we paid $40 for six bags of rubbish.” Nina also identified the need for a
dedicated ‘clean up team’ to pick up and sort rubbish the next day, as the PTA
had run out of steam to tackle this job the following morning.
For
future events, our group would like to purchase a ‘can crusher’, to enable us
to fit even more recycling in the bins.
We were also able to add some points to our planned ‘Ten Step Checklist
for Organising WasteWise Community Events’, particularly around the preparation
and clean up stages. This resource will
be given to groups and organisations in our area. Janine is preparing feedback for Waterlea
School with our key learnings from the event. We hope these lessons will enable
Waterlea to build on the success of the festival this year and create an even
more WasteWise event in 2015.
Our
assistance with the Waterlea Summer Festival provided many more learning
opportunities for our team, and showed us once again what a huge difference our
WasteWise initiative is able to make, through a partnership approach with
community groups and organisations in Mangere Bridge.
