Make A Difference Day - 27th October 2007
5 positive steps to help the environment with compost and composting
- Start composting your own kitchen, garden and packaging waste, IT'S SO EASY!
- Don't buy peat-based compost
- Tell others about the importance and ease of composting
- Contact Fairfield for a peat-free, vegan-friendly, locally-produced & sustainable compost
- Find out more about home composting from WRAP (www.wrap.org.uk)
Step 1: Make your own compost
Purchase a low-cost bin from WRAP – Waste Resources Action Programme - a government funded organisation set up to reduce waste (www.wrap.org.uk).
Train your hand to drop uncooked fruit & veg, peelings, egg shells, cardboard packaging, brown paper bags (and probably a whole heap more) into your compost bin rather than into your municipal waste bin. It's so easy, why aren't we all composting?
Step 2: Avoid peat based compost like the plague
A little known fact: Peat has absolutely no nutritional value whatsoever. Seemingly, gardeners like it because it's nice to work with and it has an inert base for adding fertilisers etc. In fact, aggressive marketing since the 1960s has managed to convince the world of landscaping and gardening that peat is an indispensable component of successful horticulture. It is totally unnecessary.
More importantly, peat extraction is unsustainable.
Since the 1960s, major commercial companies, have introduced more intensive methods of extraction. These have resulted in the unsustainable ‘mining’ of peat. The UK’s raised peat bogs have now been reduced to a fraction of their original extent. In 1996, of an original 69,000 hectares, only 5.5% (3,836 ha) of lowland raised bog could still be described as in a ‘near natural’ state.
In addition, peat bogs play an important role in the regulation of the world’s climate. Referred to as ‘global coolers,’ they remove carbon from atmospheric CO2 and serve as valuable ‘CO2 sinks.’ Unless disturbed by human activities, such as peat extraction, this carbon can be stored for near geological time periods.
Join our information group on Facebook (www.facebook.com group name: Oh for peat's sake!).
Step 3: Spread the gospel
It's a fact, composting really does help the environment as well as being sensational for your gardens.
For every morsel that ends up in your compost bin, a little less material has to be removed by the Council. If we all did our bit, far fewer municipal wagons would be polluting our streets and adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, and less would be tipped into landfill (our landfill space in the North West will be exhausted by 2010. That's only 3 years away). Waste incineration is not an answer. Would you want an incineration plant in your back garden?
Step 4: Contact Fairfield
Fairfield is diverting fruit and veg waste away from landfill and making it into compost on the New Smithfield wholesale market site.
First-time composters worry about the amount of compost they will produce from their waste. The reality is that after a year of composting, there is a surprisingly small amount of the glorious stuff to put on your gardens and allotments. Therefore, Fairfield's compost and mulch is often required in order to provide a hefty boost to kick start your soil. Our compost is ideal for soil conditioning and improvement. We also deliver.
Step 5: It's a WRAP
WRAP works to encourage and enable businesses and consumers to be more efficient in their use of materials, and recycle more things more often. This helps to minimise landfill, reduce carbon emissions and improve our environment
The Greater Manchester area receives a subsidy from WRAP on the sale of compost bins to households. Prices range between £2.00 - £8.00.
They can be purchased on-line: (http://www.recyclenow.com/home_composting/in_your_area/scheme_authorities/greater.html)
or by telephone: 0845 077 0757.
Get involved – get yourself a compost bin.
