Christmas card recycling campaign gets underway

The Woodland Trust's annual challenge got underway in London's St James's Park, where Ms Richardson – who was a contestant on ITV's “I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here” and presented BBC DIY show Changing Rooms – urged shoppers to drop off their cards as they hit the January sales.

The scheme which is jointly co-ordinated by the Trust and the national recycling campaign, Recycle Now, also has the support of four key retailers – WHSmith, Tesco, TK Maxx and Marks & Spencer.

Specially designed bins made from cardboard will be placed in stores up and down the country so customers can deposit their cards for recycling.

The Trust has set consumers a target of recycling 100 million cards this year – an increase on last year's figure of 93 million – so that it can raise money to plant trees.

Fridey Cordingley, head of Recycle Now, said: “Christmas cards are one of the easiest things to recycle after all the festivities have ended and people will not only be helping to support the Woodland Trust but helping to tackle climate change too.”

The Trust receives funds from local authorities in the form of a recycling credit for every card sent back. This is money saved in disposal costs and landfill taxes because the waste cards are diverted away from civic amenity sites.

The value of credits is set at different rates by the various local authorities but averages out at around £50 per tonne of cards.

The aim is to plant 24,000 new trees across the UK through this campaign, which follows on from the Christmas crusade for general waste, launched by Joanna Lumley last month (see letsrecycle.com story).

Recycling

The participating retailers will take charge of the recycling logistics themselves and use their existing waste management contractors to process the waste paper.

Cardiff-based Severnside will take cards from Tesco to St Regis Paper Company's mills while GSS Waste Logistics will collect the material from Marks & Spencer.

SCA Recycling – part of the SCA Group which manufactures paper products such as hygiene goods and corrugated packaging – will collected material from WHSmith and TK Maxx.

Contamination of the paper is relatively high because of substances such as glitter so the paper will be used in low grade applications, such as corrugated packaging and toilet roll tubes.

This is the 11th year of the Woodland Trust's Christmas Card Recycling Scheme and Trust spokesman Alex Claydon said: “It's become a bit of a tradition in the UK, not just in terms of the stars but because people think it's a good thing to do.”

Campaign front-woman Anna Ryder Richardson added: “I would urge everyone to recycle their cards to help plant more trees and stop recyclable waste ending up in landfill.”