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Waste disposal levy introduced
New Zealanders send around 3.2 million tones of waste to landfill
every year.
Every year, New Zealanders send around 3.2 million tonnes of waste to landfill, that’s over a tonne of rubbish per household. The majority of this waste is not reprocessed or recycled, and doesn’t break down over time.
“Disposing of waste at landfills is a sign that we’re not using our resources efficiently, and are contributing directly to pollution,” says Martyn Pinckard, Director of Operations, at the Ministry for the Environment.
“To improve the environmental future of New Zealand, we need to start taking responsibility for the waste we produce by finding more effective and efficient ways to reduce, reuse, recycle or reprocess it.”
On 25 September 2008, the Waste Minimisation Act 2008 was introduced to ‘encourage waste minimisation and decrease waste disposal in New Zealand’. Under the Act, a $10 per tonne levy (plus GST) on all waste sent to landfill is being imposed from 1 July 2009.
The levy will be charged at disposal facilities, such as landfills, which dispose of waste (including household waste) and operate, in some capacity, as businesses which dispose of waste.
The $10 per tonne waste
disposal levy will be
charged at disposal facilities,
such as landfills,
using a weighbridge.
Half of the revenue generated by the levy will go to territorial authorities, based on their population size. The funds will have to be spent solely on promoting or achieving the waste minimisation activities set out in their waste management and minimisation plans.
A waste minimisation fund will be set up with the remaining levy money, minus administration costs, to fund waste minimisation projects. Projects will be assessed according to a set of criteria that will be established in consultation with the Waste Advisory Board. The Minister for the Environment will have final approval on all project funding.
Over the past 20 years levies on waste material sent to landfill have become common place across the globe. Countries that have introduced environmental landfill levies include: Ireland, Sweden, Germany, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Israel, California in the USA, and a number of states in Australia.
“Internationally, a variety of approaches have been taken to implementing waste levies. However, the outcomes they seek are similar to those sought by New Zealand’s waste disposal levy: encouraging the diversion of waste away from landfill and generating funding for projects aimed at achieving waste minimisation.
“Placing a levy on waste helps us to recognise the real social, economic and environmental impact and cost that waste has on people and the environment. The levy is designed to encourage people and organisations to rethink how they dispose of waste and will reward efforts made to divert material from landfill to be used in waste minimisation activities,” Pinckard says.
For more information go to:
http://www.mfe.govt.nz/issues/waste/waste-disposal-levy/index.html
