A local council is following in the footsteps of crisp company Walkers by working on a new scheme which aims to get more people to recycle items that are currently excluded from regular domestic recycling collections.

East Cambridgeshire District Council (ECDC) have partnered up with Terracycle, who are an innovative waste management company that specialise in hard-to-recycle waste including crisp packets and sweet wrappers. 

Walkers partnered with the same company back in October 2018 after members of the public began to post their empty crisp packet wrappers back to Walkers through the Royal Mail service.

The campaign was hosted by 38 degrees, who called for Walkers to make their crisp packets recyclable.

ECDC have jumped on board with the scheme which offers a free recycling point where members of the public can bring in items which they cannot currently put into their blue bins.

A specific recycling bin has now been installed in the reception of the East Cambridgeshire District Council offices at The Grange and accepts all brands of crisp packets, sweet wrappers, chocolate bar wrappers and snack bags.

The wrappers are collected and sent off to Terracycle, where they are separated by plastic type, cleaned and extruded into plastic pellets to make new recycled products. 

Councillor Julia Huffer who is waste service delivery champion for East Cambridgeshire District Council said: “The reaction nationwide to the 38 degrees campaign shows that there is a need for this service and we want to do our bit for our district.

“Recycling is of paramount importance in our district and this is another exciting scheme which the council has adopted to urge members of the public to recycle more of their waste.

“Since transferring our waste services to East Cambs Street Scene, we have been able to take on campaigns like these which help us get one step closer to our recycling target of 60% in the district.

“We are thrilled to have this programme available to our residents and we hope they utilise this facility.”

East Cambridgeshire District Council also adopted the Metal Matters scheme last year in a bid to recycle more metal in the district and have supported the Bin It Your Way initiative aimed at cleaning and keeping the streets of the district clean from chewing gum.

Similarly, the council have a recycling champion, Michael Recycle, who was recently awarded gold at the Chartered Institute of Public Relations Pride awards for the Anglia, Thames and Chiltern region in the education campaign category.

For more information on recycling in East Cambridgeshire, visit: https://www.eastcambs.gov.uk/content/recycling-and-waste-ecss