Councils and community sector included in latest WRAP board posts

The appointments strengthen WRAP's expertise and include Kay Twitchen, who has been an Essex County councillor since 1989 and Nick Francis, director of the Community Recycling Network.

Jennie Price, chief executive of WRAP, said: “We have a very good group of people with an interesting mix of skills and experience to move WRAP forward. We are extremely positive as we are getting from the strategy into the action and delivery phase and with the major newsprint competition which was recently announced, things are starting to really move forward.”

Ms Twitchen is chairman of the Local Government Association Waste and Environmental Management Executive. She is also member of the Committee of European Municipalities and Regions Environment Committee, president of Association for the Sustainable Use and Recovery of Resources in Europe and chairman of Regional Environmental Protection Advisory Committee for the Anglian Region of the Environment Agency.

Mr Francis is also director of markets and development for Avon Friends of the Earth and is a previous chairman of the Independent Waste Paper Processors and a founder member of the Council of the British Recovered Paper Association.

The other appointments are:

• Dr Robert Chilton, director of Local Government Studies with the Audit Commission since 1989, who has completed a series of secondments including interim chief executive of the Greater London Authority, interim commissioner for Transport with Transport for London and chief executive of the Local Government Commission.

• Tony Elmer, who has recently retired from Tesco as commercial director, where he was responsible for the purchasing and profitability of food products. Since 1994 he has been involved with the Tesco acquisitions of major retailers in Scotland, Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland and international development in central Europe. He was, until last year, a director of the Institute of Grocery Distribution.
• Tim Sweeney, who has since 1994, been director general of the British Bankers Association. Previously he worked for the Bank of England and has experience in financial markets, regulation and the formulation of government policy.

The new non-executive directors join the existing board members: Michael Averill, group chief executive of Shanks; Professor George Fleming, University of Strathclyde EnviroCentre; Richard Bird, head of energy, environment and waste directorate at the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and WRAP chief executive Jennie Price. The board is advised by David Dougherty, founder and former executive director of the Clean Washington Center, Seattle.

WRAP is a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee and is supported by contributions from Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, DTI, the Scottish Executive and the National Assembly for Wales, totalling 40 million over three years.