International Review of Waste Management Policy - Department of ...

strengthened as the increased costs of raw materials push commerce and industry to
look to secondary materials. This situation may, however, be changing in the wake of
recent collapses in the price of some secondary materials. It remains to be seen
whether this price collapse is long-lived, or a short-lived over-correction to the price of
these commodities.
Denmark
The 29 % household waste collection rate was far short of the 2000 target of 49 %.
According to Green Alliance, 659 the principle reasons for this shortfall are a lack of
mandatory separate collection of biowaste and a heavy reliance on bring sites for the
collection of glass and paper/cardboard, as opposed to door-to-door collections.
Danish waste management policy is heavily influenced by fixed investments made in
the past in incineration capacity.
England (Barnet Compulsory Recycling)
As mentioned in Section 34.2.1.1, alongside the requirement that collection
authorities in England and Wales must separately collect at the kerbside any two
recyclable materials, Barnet Borough Council also implemented a compulsory
recycling scheme to 25,000 households in 2004. Participation by householders
involved in the scheme was monitored over a number of weeks, with those
households found not to be participating subsequently sent a letter further advising
them of the scheme and alerting them as to the legal basis of the scheme. Continued
lack of participation resulted in further postal contact, followed by an eventual doorknocking
campaign. By the end of this monitoring stage, only 9 households were still
not participating.
Following introduction of the compulsory scheme, the year on year increase in
recycling rate for the whole of Barnet (113,000 households) rose from 10 % in 2003
to more than 20 % the following year, indicating the affect of media attention on the
scheme in increasing recycling across the Council, not just for the 25,000 trial
households. This higher recycling rate was, however, only sustained longer-term from
the 25,000 households for which recycling was compulsory, where official contact
from the council reinforced the message of the requirement to recycle. More than
three-quarters of a survey of 500 residents in Barnet (both those on, and not on, the
compulsory scheme) considered compulsory recycling to be a good idea, with support
higher in those areas already forming part of the compulsory scheme, though
confusion remains regarding exactly which materials form part of compulsory
recycling, and even which households are part of the current scheme. 660
It should be noted that the Barnet scheme incorporates the threat of legal action as a
last resort in the event of non-compliance with the scheme. It remains uncertain,
however, as to whether the justification which the council uses in order to stipulate
659 Green Alliance (2002) Creative Policy Packages for Waste: Lessons for the UK, Available at
http://www.greenalliance.org.uk/uploadedFiles/Publications/CPPWDenmark.pdf
660 Eunomia (2009) Compulsory Recycling Scheme Review and Second Phase Roll Out Plan, Final
Report to the London Borough of Barnet.
555
International Review of Waste Policy: Annexes