ESSEX-based EWD Recycling has begun a food waste collection trial designed to help Colchester Borough Council improve its recycling rate.

EWD, which has bases in Brightlingsea, Clacton and Ardleigh, is collecting food waste from around 7,000 households to which the company has supplied purpose-made sealed bins, with the first week of collections under the scheme having totalled more than 12 tonnes.

The trial is due to run for a year, with Essex County Council processing the waste on behalf of the borough authority.

Besides preventing hundreds of tonnes of food waste going to landfill, there will also be a knock-on benefit in terms of reduced emissions of methane gas, which contributes to climate change, from landfill sites in future.

Alan Day, operations manager at EWD, said: “We are pleased that our forward thinking and open mind policy of adapting to our customers’ needs and requirements has resulted in us being once again at the forefront of such an excitiing new venture.”