Visit from the Waiōrea Community Recycling Centre

The Waiōrea Community Recycling Centre held a Logo Design Workshop for some of our Year 9, 10, 12 and 13 students. The WCRC wanted students’ input in designing the logo for the centre and hear what students would love to see happen at the site. They hope to use students’ contributions for the core value and philosophy behind the logo.

The Waiōrea Community Recycling Centre are also holding a Market Day – 10th December from 9am to 1pm in collaboration with the Western Springs Garden Community Hall with entertainment music, free face painting, food trucks, and stalls including Tipping Point, Dress for Success, Koha Apparel, Auckland Council Waste Wise team and Compost Collective.  

You can come as a guest and have fun, but you can also come as a stallholder selling upcycled arts/crafts, baking, fruits and vegetables or as a volunteer to help with cleaning the dishes for community to reuse as this is a Zero Waste event.

Email christine@mphs.org.nz to get in touch with WCRC and register your interest.

Recycling in Tāmaki Makaurau

What happens to your recycling?
Step 1 – Pick up: Your recycling is picked up by Auckland Council and taken for sorting at a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF).
Step 2 – Sorting: Wrong items like plastic bags, clothing, batteries and food scraps are removed by hand. This makes sure that we only recover the materials that can be recycled.
Step 3 – Separation: Most of our recycling is sorted at an automated facility. Paper and cardboard is separated with a vibrating machine while metal items are removed using magnets or an eddy current. Optical scanners identify different types of plastic. All that’s left is the glass, which is sorted by colour. Once your recycling is sorted, it’s sold to make new products in New Zealand as well as overseas.

Where does your recycling go?

Glass is recycled in New Zealand. It’s mainly turned into bottles and jars but can also be made into what’s known as ‘glasscrete’ and ‘glassphalt’, which is a material used in road building.
Paper and cardboard can be made into newsprint, writing paper, tissue, corrugated cardboard, egg cartons and fruit trays. This is done in New Zealand as well as Asia.
Plastic, depending on the type, is either processed here in NZ (33% in 2021) or sent to Australia and Southeast Asia (around 60% in 2021) to be made into just about anything plastic can be made in to, which is a lot! Buckets, polyester fibre and wheelie bins are just some of the new forms our plastic takes.
Aluminium is used to make new aerosol and drink cans, while steel is made into food cans, wire and building materials in Asia. 

So why does New Zealand export recyclable materials?
Since New Zealand has a relatively small population, we don’t generate a lot of recyclable material so there’s not as much demand for recycling processing facilities in this country.
Even though exporting our recyclables overseas means that they need to be transported further, it’s often a better environmental option than using raw materials.

Source: makethemostofwaste.co.nz/recycling/what-happens-to-your-recycling

Sustainable Products

āma NATURAL MUSCLE RUB GEL – This creamy elixir of natural botanics blended with cocoa butter is a super effective and soothing natural muscle rub. Known to relieve your aches and pains while keeping your skin silky and moisturised. – Use this natural muscle rub gel to relieve muscle aches and cramps – reduce muscle inflammation – ease PMT cramps – speed up muscle recovery time and healing support exercise and sports performance – use for massages on sore and aching muscles and joints – moisturises the skin – All natural ingredients.

Looking for a sustainable Christmas gift? Why not get an Ethique sampler pack? Face, body or hair, each contains 5 sample size products.