Households are throwing away over one billion items every year that could be recycled but are being incinerated or sent to landfill, according to WRAP.
WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) released the statistics ahead of Recycle Week (14-20 October).
According to the statistics, Britain’s most binned items included
- 7.4 million yoghurt pots.
- 845 million cleaning product bottles.
- 526 million aerosols.
- 6 million aftershave and perfume bottles.
Additional research by Recycle Now found that while 88% of the UK regularly recycle, 79% put one or more items into the bin that could have been recycled.
UK household recycling rates remained at 44% in 2022, the same rate as in 2021, according to figures released by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).
Commenting on the findings, Circular Economy Minister Mary Creagh, said: “With recycling rates falling and over one billion recyclable items binned annually, we have a huge task ahead to create the zero-waste society we all want to see.
“This year’s Recycle Week, we can all do our bit by rescuing more rubbish from the bin and recycling it instead.
“It’s also why this government will move towards a circular economy where we keep our resources in use for longer, waste is reduced, and the path to net zero is accelerated.”
Recycle Week
On Monday, Invictus games athlete and Recycle Week Ambassador JJ Chalmers, WRAP CEO Harriet Lamb and a crew of Recycle Week characters visited 10 Downing Street to deliver an open letter to Keir Starmer, which asked for the PM and the public’s help to increase recycling.
The Recycle Week characters include Dee Dee the deodorant, Rey the plastic trigger spray, Yogi the yoghurt pot, Fitz the perfume bottle and Hube the toilet roll tube.
Harriet Lamb, WRAP CEO, said: “Too often we’re putting goods such as deodorant cans, yogurt pots or cleaning bottles in the rubbish when they can in fact be recycled.
“The more items we rescue from the main bin, the less goes to landfill and incineration, the more we reduce our impact on the climate.
“This Recycle Week we urge every household, business, school and organisation to help rescue more items from the rubbish bin so that we can achieve a world where ‘landfill’ becomes little more than a memory, where we are recycling everything possible – and of course reducing the amount we use in the first place.”
