The Australian Council of Recycling (ACOR) is leading a national recycling education program to take the guesswork out of recycling for the community.
Australians have a proven desire to recycle correctly and reduce what goes to landfill, but often feel unsure if they are always getting it right, whether at home, at a friend’s house or on holiday. Many councils across Australia have different recycling systems and the away-from-home recycling options are increasing which is adding to the community confusion.
This is where the Recycle Mate mobile phone app, website and supporting education program is working to help remove the confusion. And the recycling industry and the community can all get involved.
Recycle Mate gives users the ability to photograph an item or do a word search of an extensive item catalogue to find out where to recycle or dispose of that item either in their local council bin system or elsewhere. Utilising modern image recognition technology, the app is continually learning as community use provides feedback about what they want to know is recyclable.
With over 500 local councils (many with different recycling systems), hundreds of industry recyclers and thousands of away from home recycling opportunities, Recycle Mate is a game-changer. The program has comprehensively catalogued every council’s recycling system and over 40,000 away from home recycling options to provide quick access to localised information to help people recycle whether at home, at a friend’s house or when on holiday.
By developing a national platform for all to use, Recycle Mate avoids the duplication of councils having to do the same thing 500 times and provides a one-stop promotional opportunity, free for all product stewardship schemes and recycling programs. Everyone can now benefit from the one program and contribute to a national recycling conversation.
Our recycling industry is not static so we need more dynamic ways to communicate the latest news and opportunities to the public as our industry continually finds new ways to reduce waste and recover valuable resources.
Recycle Mate now provides a national platform that is live and allows our governments, recyclers and the whole community to all work together to gather, share and update localised recycling information as our industry evolves.
