The State of Queensland in Australia has said that more than 10 million containers have been returned through Containers for Change scheme.
Image: Queensland’s container refund scheme has allowed to return and recycle more than 10 million containers. Photo: courtesy of Louis Hansel / Unsplash.
Launched on 1 November 2018, the container refund scheme provides people with an incentive to collect and return containers for recycling, in exchange for a 10 cent refund payment.
Queensland has launched the scheme to reduce the amount of drink containers that are littered and increase the recycling rate in the state.
The scheme is also said to help social enterprises, communities, and regional and remote areas to create new job, recycling and fundraising opportunities.
Currently, the scheme is operated through more than 230 container refund points across the state.
Under the scheme, the funding will also be provided to small-scale infrastructure projects to improve access to container refund and donation points in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
In addition, the funding will be provided to community groups, charities and not-for-profit organizations to establish donation points to collect containers.
The Queensland Government has selected not-for-profit group Container Exchange (CoEx) as the product responsibility organisation (PRO) for the development and manage the container refund scheme in the scheme.
The PRO has taken responsibility to efficiently operate the scheme, and offer convenient and state-wide access to container refund points.
Queensland Minister for environment and the great barrier reef Leeanne Enoc noted that Queenslanders were recycling through the container refund scheme.
“Containers for Change started less than a fortnight ago, and we are seeing some amazing recycling results,” Ms Enoch said.
“With more than 10 million containers being recycled, this means more than $1 million has gone back to Queenslanders and charities.”
According to the minister, Queensland has one of the lowest recycling rates in Australia and currently send about 55% of waste to landfill.
Enoch further added that other ways Queenslanders can improve recycling is through education.
“Help Queensland turn the tide on recycling and encourage your friends and family to get involved in recycling at home, at school and in the workplace.”