Your YFC’s guide to setting up a recycling scheme in your county to raise awareness and funds.
The YFC Recycle Challenge aims to encourage the agricultural community to recycle more of their waste, whilst also supporting and educating the next generation of farmers.
Farmers have a legal duty to send waste off farm for either recycling or landfill. The waste must be disposed of by an authorised company, in return they will produce a Waste Transfer Note to show that it was disposed of lawfully. This Waste Transfer Note is required by Farm Assurance schemes such as Red Tractor.
Recycling is also much kinder to the environment than sending plastic to landfill where chemical containers, for example, will last forever without degrading.
A scheme was set up between Essex FYFC and CSH Environmental (a local waste management company) to recycle agricultural waste. CSH Environmental sort and bale plastic and cardboard waste and sell it to the market in bulk to be recycled into new products.
The proceeds from selling the waste were donated to Essex FYFC at the end of the year. So far this has resulted in £12,000 being donated to Essex County Federation, with plans to grow the scheme further. Watch the video to find out more.
To set up a YFC recycling scheme, we recommend a representative from your County Federation approaches a local waste management company. Most recycling companies will be aware of the value of the material involved, but many do not have outlets where they can sell it. In these cases, CSH Environmental in Essex can purchase the material from other waste collectors around the UK.
The waste company your County Federation works with will need to accept clean cardboard, polybags and washed chemical cans to be tipped for free. The waste company should be able to sell this material, which means your County Federation can explore a partnership that provides a percentage of that sale to be gifted to YFC.
In Essex, the waste management company set up their systems so farmers could deliver their waste directly into the disposal site and tip on the YFC account. Where a farmer/waste producer cannot deliver their material to the site, YFCs can organise events to collect the material on behalf of the producer (eg tractor runs) – but please note you will need to be covered by a waste carriers' licence.
Each County Federation will need to manage and organise the communications between the waste producer and the company disposing of it.
A YFC member collecting and delivering waste needs to be covered by a waste carriers’ licence.
For a small fee these licences can be purchased from the Environment Agency or the waste management company could offer the use of their waste carriers' license to cover an event. This would need to be discussed and agreed in advance with the waste company your County Federation is working with on the challenge.
This project can potentially provide a sustainable income stream for the county federations, for example, in the Essex Federation recycling scheme, the waste company CSH Environmental gifts 50% of the profits, after the sorting costs have been removed. Over the past 12 months, Essex FYFC have raised more than £12,000 through the scheme with aims to grow it further through promotion of the scheme.
NFYFC invites any county looking to explore this project future and set it up in their county to get in touch with Sophie.Willingale@nfyfc.org.uk at NFYFC for further information.
Young Farmers gain life experience engaging with local companies, learning how businesses work whilst also teaching others how to recycle their waste.
For your efforts a donation should be made by the waste management company to support your YFCs’ training, events and social programme.
The farmer gets their waste disposed of for free whilst also knowing their material is not going into landfill and is instead being reused to make new items. The farmer is also supporting the next generation of farmers.
Waste management companies receive an income from the material sales, a new customer base and good publicity from the campaign, whilst also supporting a local good cause.
By recycling more of our waste, it means we’re saving energy, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and helping to tackle climate change.
NFYFC has a Curve module call Plastic Pollution Prevention and your local YFC Trainer can deliver this during one of your club meetings. Speak to your County Office to make arrangements with your local YFC Trainer. We are encouraging YFC Trainers to deliver this module this year, with an award to the trainer who can deliver the most modules.
For more information about the Curve module, contact natasha.dennis@nfyfc.org.uk
The YFC Recycle Challenge is kindly supported by:
