Environment Minister Michelle McIlveen has welcomed the reduction in the amount of household waste going to landfill.
Statistics published today show that the quarterly household landfill rate for January to March 2016 was 40.3%, a decrease of 6.8 percentage points compared to the same period in 2015.
The tonnage of household materials sent for recycling, reuse and composting reached 77,593 tonnes, generating a household recycling rate of 38.3%.
Welcoming the statistics, Minister McIlveen said: “It is encouraging that more household waste is being diverted from landfill and being recycled, reused and composted.
"Hopefully, this positive trend will continue and more households will avail of the various recycling initiatives provided by their local council, such as kerbside recycling and organic collection services for food waste. Diversion of these materials from landfill reduces the environmental impact of waste generation through reduced greenhouse gas and leachate emissions.”
The landfill rate has now reached its lowest ever level for this quarter.
Notes to editors:
1. Municipal Waste Management Statistics Reports and the last for the reporting year 2015-16.
2. There are eleven indicators covered in the Local Authority Collected Municipal Waste Management Statistics report, covering Local Authority Collected municipal waste, household waste and biodegradable local authority collected municipal waste. The indicators have been calculated from the WasteDataFlow (WDF) system, which is used by all UK local authorities to report municipal waste.
3. Electronic copies of both reports are available at the DAERA website.
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