Executives in the Irish waste system told The Hard Shoulder that Irish homes struggle to use the right bags for the compost bins.
Waste experts have warned that Ireland is seeing more food waste going into general bins than compost.
Not all biodegradable bags can be put into a compost bin which causes issues with proper waste recycling.
Executives in the Irish waste system told The Hard Shoulder that Irish homes struggle to use the right bags for the compost bins.
Secretary of the Irish Waste Management Association, Conor Walsh told The Hard Shoulder host Ciara Kelly that she wasn’t alone in thinking compostable and biodegradable bags were the same and using them interchangeably.
“There’s a difference between compostable bags and biodegradable bags”, he told Newstalk on Friday.
“It’s not our biggest concern in the waste industry.
“Our biggest concern, actually, is that there's more food waste going into the general waste bin than into the brown bins across the country.
“Our goal is to encourage people to use the brown bin and use compostable liners.
“If they're labelled compostable, buy them, they're fine. I don't think the public should get hung up on the difference between compostable and biodegradable.”
The contamination in brown bins reaches between 5 to 10 percent, he explained.
Food waste in a recycling caddy.“It isn’t as high as the recycling bin but it’s more problematic in the brown bin because it’s harder to get out once it’s mixed in there.”
Waste experts warn about brown bin usage
Mr Conor Walsh of the Irish Waste Management Association, added that it was up to the product specification authorities to make sure bags were correctly labelled in the supermarket.
“If it's made from cornstarch, whether they call it biodegradable or compostable, it's fine. It will break down in the environment”, Mr Walsh said.
Tad Kirakowski, chief executive of Voice Ireland, said that efforts were being made to ensure that brown bins were being used to sort food waste effectively.
Food waste in a recycling bin at home, 16-9-17. Image: Daisy-Daisy / Alamy“We know that the huge amount of material that's in your general waste bin could be going into those food waste bins.
“Where this conversation gets a little bit more tricky is when we look past the bags and we start to look at where most of us engage with those compostable materials and it's when we're getting the coffee on the go or the food on the go and the cup that you get it in.”
Mr Walsh added that there was an argument for large bins as opposed to small bins, with bug bins lowering the risk of people “putting things in the wrong bin.
