Tuesday 27 May 2014

£800k for clever waste prevention partnerships

Grants of up to £50,000 are available for businesses, councils, charities and voluntary groups that come up with innovative ideas to prevent waste.

They are being invited to join forces to bid for a share of the Innovation in Waste Prevention Fund worth £800,000.

Two or more parties working together can apply with local-level ideas for preventing waste of “priority materials” such as food, textiles, furniture, electronic and electrical equipment, paper, construction, healthcare and chemicals.

These materials are outlined in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs’ plan, ‘Waste Prevention Programme for England’.

Eligible projects include councils working with local companies to re-use and repair items that businesses no longer need and firms working with educational groups to design products that result in less waste.

Jude Andrews, Project Manager at WRAP which is managing the fund said: “Preventing waste is about finding ways to keep items in use longer and not generating as much waste in the first place.

“It’s about rethinking the way we do things – redesigning and remanufacturing the things we use – changing attitudes and changing behaviours about what we buy and what we throw away but most of all, working together and thinking creatively to do something about it.”

Initiatives that aren’t supported by the fund are recycling or composting projects such as food waste collections and home composting.