Waste Management and Minimisation Plan

We're starting to draft a new Waste Management and Minimisation Plan (WMMP) for the district and need your help.

Imagine if by working together we could shift our district's waste story from production and disposal to keeping our resources in use and adding value for our people and environment.

Waste is everyone's responsibility. Each of us has an impact on the amount of waste we generate and where it ends up. Setting a clear direction for how waste is minimised relies on working together to lead and develop innovative and achievable solutions.

Every week, we send around 920 tonnes of waste to the Victoria Flats Landfill. Most of this could be avoided all together with the right services, facilities and education.

That's where the WMMP comes in. It will set the direction for our district to transition to a low-emissions, low-waste society, built upon a circular economy.

Quick links

What's a WMMP | Where are we heading? | How you can get involved

What is a Waste Management and Minimisation Plan?

Every six years, Council has to review its Waste Management and Minimisation Plan (WMMP) plan to "promote effective and efficient waste management and minimisation”, and to comply with the Waste Minimisation Act (2008). The plan is a guide for how the district will minimise and manage its waste to protect resources and the environment.

The last WMMP was adopted in 2018. Since then we've made lots of progress with actions to divert material from landfill and reduce our waste. Some highlights include:

• Introduction of the three bin kerbside collection service for eligible properties. This allowed us to separate out the glass recycling stream to improve the quality and quantity of the recyclable material across the district
• Investment in education to ensure residents and visitors know how to use the local service and opportunities for waste reduction
• Introduced a waste minimisation contestable fund to increase support for community-led waste minimisation initiatives
• Completed a business case to introduce a kerbside organics collection service for eligible properties
• Established partnerships with key organisations helping to deliver on WMMP actions, including Wao, Wastebusters, Wānaka Community Workshop, Zero Waste Glenorchy, Grow Wanaka, OneBike, KiwiHarvest, Plastic Free Wanaka, and Sustainable Queenstown
• Secured co-funding from the Ministry for the Environment’s (MfE) Waste Minimisation Fund for the delivery of the Community Composting Project. The focus of the project is to support the establishment of a network of Community Composting Hubs across the district that will divert organic material, food scraps and garden waste, from landfill and turn it into a beneficial resource for use in community gardens, restoration projects, or to provide back to the community.
• Developed and launched an extensive Event Waste and Emissions Reduction Guide, offering practical tips, templates, checklists and supporting information for event organisers.
• Facilitated workshops to help event organisers understand how to reduce their waste and emissions.
• Worked with the Events Team to incorporate a sustainability focus into their events funding process.
• We have actively supported Wastebusters in their efforts to help businesses reduce waste by funding district-wide workshops, waste audits, and the development of industry-specific guidelines. These initiatives have included creating case studies for sharing best practices where businesses can learn from experts and peers about effective waste reduction strategies.

These actions are working well, but there are still lots of challenges and opportunities to work on.

Our new WMMP will align more closely with New Zealand's waste strategy te rautaki para.

Where are we heading?

While we are still in the very early stages of developing a draft WMMP, our approach will be to explore opportunities aligned with the waste hierarchy and focus on collaborative solutions.

How can you get involved?

There will be lots of opportunities to get involved in this project:

Stakeholder workshops

The first part of this process is to work with our stakeholders early on to understand the key issues and opportunities for targeted sectors. This involves a series of workshops for the construction and demolition industry, tourism and business operators, waste and recycling service providers and community/environmental groups. These are scheduled to run 3-5 September 2024.

Webinar

We held a webinar on 12 September 2024. This webinar covered the district's current waste challenges and opportunities, the process for developing a new WMMP and how the community can get involved. If you missed it, we've provided a recording - take a look at the video section on the right hand side of this page.

Online brainstorming

Our online ideas board is now live! This is aimed at hearing from you on what we should be focusing on - sometimes even the smallest ideas can make a big impact! We'd love to hear from you!

Formal consultation

A draft WMMP is expected to be released for formal consultation in 2025.