The new joint Waste Management and Minimisation Plan (WMMP) for 2018 - 2024 was adopted by the Napier City Council today (18 September), following on from the Hastings District Council’s adoption on 30 August.The WMMP aims to reduce the amount of waste going to landfill and encourages increased waste minimisation.Prepared by the Hastings District and Napier City councils, extensive public feedback was received when the plan went out for consultation, with four days of hearings held in June to consider more than 6000 submissions from Hastings and Napier residents.Joint council waste futures project steering group chairperson and Hastings deputy mayor Tania Kerr said the Hastings District Council’s adoption of the plan marked the conclusion of a thorough process investigating ways to minimise waste and protect the environment.“We were delighted with the level of the engagement from the community on this plan with some great ideas put forward and a comprehensive number of issues covered.”“This feedback helped shape the plan, which will make an impressive difference to the future of our landfill and will continue to have a very positive effect on the environment.”She said the council was keen to work collaboratively with the community in the coming years to identify alternative options to minimise waste, with an emphasis on education and continuing to identify community-based solutions.Napier councillor and group deputy chairperson Annette Brosnan was also very pleased with the outcome. “Our Councils have adopted to move to a weekly recycling service for Napier, providing standard recycling bins and also a small 80L general refuse bin from 2020. “I’m very proud of this strategy, for its aspiration, its community input and its practical challenge to us all to be more waste wise.Our community’s needs are diverse so there is lots of flexibility built into the plan.”In 2016/17 the Omarunui Landfill, jointly owned by Hastings District and Napier City Councils, received 84,000 tonnes of waste, 49.1 per cent of which was commonly recyclable and/or compostable material.Of the remainder a significant amount was potentially divertable, such as electronic waste, wood waste, plaster board and scrap metal.The joint WMMP takes into account the feedback received and is designed to facilitate increased household recycling as well as identify other means to significantly reduce the amount of waste going into the landfill, thus increasing its lifespan as well as improving our environmental footprint.Among the initiatives, plastic council rubbish bags would be replaced by small 80 litre general rubbish wheelie bins that would be provided to every home in current council collection areas.Initially rubbish would be collected weekly with a possible move to fortnightly as people became more skilled at waste minimisation.To promote increased recycling, the plan included providing recycling containers to ensure plastics, paper and glass were kept as clean as possible to enable them to be recycled.The aim is to work collaboratively with the waste collection industry to set up incentive schemes to encourage people to separate out their green waste for composting, either at home or commercially.Local businesses and industries also had an opportunity and responsibility to manage waste appropriately and the plan proposed to better communicate the services available to local organisations, providing more education around improved waste practices.The overall vision of the joint WMMP is to deliver waste minimisation and resource recovery across Hastings District and Napier City, working towards zero waste.This initially includes increasing the amount of recyclables diverted from landfill by 20 per cent and decreasing the amount of organic matter going to landfill by 30 per cent.