Weekly Food Organics and Garden Organics (FOGO) Collection Trial

If it grows, it goes in FOGO!  Meaning that anything that grows (or once grew) belongs in the green FOGO bin, mostly importantly food!

This includes:

• all food waste (including meat, fish, bones, dairy/eggs, fruit, vegetables, and bread),
• soiled paper products (shredded paper, paper towel, tissues, and pizza boxes),
• Australian certified compostable packaging (AS4736 or AS5810),
• all garden organics (e.g. prunings and grass clippings).
• Material placed in the green-lid FOGO bin is collected by East Waste and taken to a Jeffries (a commercial composting facility) where it is turned into compost for growing our food.

Did you know that almost 36% of materials found in most red landfill bins could be placed in the green FOGO bin?
This includes:

• 24% food (loose or in compostable bags)
• 9% packaged/bagged food (which could be unpackaged and placed in the green FOGO bin)
• 3% garden organics (lawn clippings, leaves, weeds and clippings) as well as compostable paper and cardboard (paper bags, pizza boxes, tissues
  and paper towel)

Just 16% of food waste is correctly disposed by residents via organics (green) bins. This means that 84% is being wasted in the red landfill bin or contaminating the yellow recycle bin.

By offering a more frequent FOGO collection, we aim to decrease the amount of recyclable and compostable materials being put in the red landfill bins and provide a more economically sustainable waste collection service.

Because we want to make sure we get it right for our residents and businesses!

The intent of the trial is to identify and assess a wide range of matters, including:

• community acceptance
• logistical matters
• environmental outcomes
• economic value.

Residents: If your property has never had a green FOGO bin, please fill out the New Bin Service form or contact East Waste to set up a new service. If your green FOGO bin has been stolen, please fill in a ‘missing or stolen bin form’ on the East Waste website.

Businesses: If your business has never had a green FOGO bin, please fill out the New Bin Service form and we will deliver one before the trial start date. Contact East Waste 8347 5111 or email east@eastwaste.com

• Gives residents and businesses more bin capacity each fortnight – 860 litres vs 760 litres per fortnight, which is 240L more to place food scraps and garden organics in the green bin. A 13% overall increase in bin disposal capacity.
• Delivers a more cost-effective and environmentally sustainable service than the current offering.
• Provides a more convenient option for recycling food waste.
• Lower landfill volumes and greenhouse gas emissions – reducing food waste is the third biggest action for reversing global warming.
• Reduced payments of the SA Solid Waste Levy and lessen the impact of potential future increases in the levy.
• Increased recycling of food waste via FOGO bins – these materials are sent for composting and used by local farms and gardens to increase the return of nutrients to the soil and reduce irrigation needs.
• Supports local jobs – composting creates 6.1 full time equivalent jobs per 10,000 tonnes of waste, compared to 2.8 for landfill.
• Actively encourages the community to place more food organics in their FOGO bin whilst reducing bin odour.

City of Prospect and East Waste encourage all households and residents to ‘Give weekly FOGO a GoGo!’ before deciding if the new system is right for them. We appreciate it is significant change, but we believe the benefits are well worth it!

We understand not all households are the same, and the weekly FOGO collection model for City of Prospect will give some choice and flexibility to households if they need a bigger bin.

We ask that trial households ‘Give Weekly FOGO a GoGo!’ Reducing waste saves you money whilst taking pressure off your rates or rent. To learn how you can reduce waste, please read our helpful waste reduction tips here. If you’re specifically worried about the smell of nappies or other personal hygiene products in your red bin, click here for tips on managing this easily.

If, after a few weeks, you still have capacity or other concerns, contact East Waste on 8347 5111 or email us east@eastwaste.com. Additional capacity requests will be reviewed.

We’d love for you to give the trial a go and we’re here to support you through the trial however we can.

If after a few weeks, you find that you have capacity or other concerns, just give us a call on 8347 5111 or email us at east@eastwaste.com, so we can work out a solution for you.

If you really don’t think this trial is for you right now, you can choose to ‘opt-out’ and remain on the standard three bin service (weekly landfill, fortnightly green FOGO and recycling collections).