Benn launches reduce, reuse, recycle campaign

Our campaign is encouraging everyone to rethink what they might think of as ‘waste' and ‘recycling' 

 
Hilary Benn

The £800,000 initiative, entitled ‘Remember. Reduce. Reuse. Recycle', is being delivered as part of the government's Act On CO2 campaign. It is set to take the form of radio and print adverts and offer tips on recycling, reusing and waste minimisation efforts – with a particular focus on food waste, electrical waste and textiles.

The campaign was first announced two weeks ago by Environment secretary Hilary Mr Benn as part of wider plans to turn Britain into a “Zero Waste Nation” (see letsrecycle.com story) .

Launching the initiative, Mr Benn stressed the importance of tackling waste to tackle climate change.

He said: “Making better use of everything around us will really help us to tackle the impact our waste has on climate change, and save us money too.

“That's why our campaign is encouraging everyone to rethink what they might think of as ‘waste' and ‘recycling' – we can all do things like put our old sofa on Freecycle rather than taking it to the dump, or recycle our old mobile if we get a new one.”

In addition to the print and radio adverts, Defra has launched a dedicated website offering tips and advice on how residents can make better use of the things which are regularly disposed of in landfill through reusing through schemes such as Freecycle.

And, while the campaign appears to be pushing a very similar message to the Waste and Resources Action Programme's long-running Recycle Now campaign, Defra insisted that the two would not compete.

A Defra spokeswoman said: “It's quite different to Recycle Now which is quite a broad campaign. This is about making better use of everything. We are trying to look at all three Rs – moving it up the waste hierarchy. It complements Recycle Now and is not intended to replace that but moves the debate on.”

“Recycle Now is still very much what we are doing with WRAP. Our campaign is very much the direction that everything is taking. It's not intended to compete.”