MID Devon District Council (MDDC) is pleased to announce it has made a leap forward in recycling performance figures and it says it is good news all round.

For the first time ever MDDC is now recycling more than half of all the waste generated.

It says that residents have helped push up the recycling rate for 2015/16 to 50.8 per cent, compared to 48.2 per cent the year before.

Councillor Neal Davey, cabinet member for the environment, said: “This is a fantastic achievement and we want to thank Mid Devon residents who have embraced and adapted to the recent changes to the service.

“We could not have achieved this without the backing of householders and I want to thank them for all their efforts.”

As residents will be aware, the district council made some significant strategic changes to its waste and recycling collection arrangements during the last 12 months.

The first change, in response to customer requests, was to collect mixed plastics and cardboard and to provide a weekly food waste collection service to all residents.

The second change was to introduce a chargeable garden waste collection service in order to offset some of the funding cuts imposed by central government and to pay for the enhanced recycling service.

The overarching driver of these changes, the council says, was to see increased levels of recycling but, more importantly, to significantly reduce the amount of waste going to landfill.

The latest performance figures support these changes and show not only an increase in recycling rates but also a reduction in the waste going to landfill.

At the end of 2015/16 the council sent 423kgs of waste per household to landfill compared with 553kgs in 2006/07 – a decrease of nearly 23 per cent.

The council has also shown a reduction in the total amount of waste generated.

The UK generates more than 100 million tonnes of waste each year, with the average household producing more than a tonne of waste.

In Mid Devon there was a reduction of 0.028 tonnes per household to 0.857 tonnes, which is a 3.16 per cent reduction.

Alan Quick