Inner West councillors support expansion of food waste recycling program

By SEJA AL ZAIDI

Inner West Council will discuss the introduction of food organics and garden organics (FOGO) recycling to all residences this Tuesday at its first meeting of the new year. 

Newly-elected Labor Councillor Mat Howard has tabled a motion proposing that council “commits to provide food organics and organics waste recycling (FOGO) to every home in the Inner West in the current term of council”.

The feasibility of rolling out the FOGO program to all types of dwellings in the Inner West will be assessed by the council, following the expansion of the program to all apartments in the last council term.

FOGO services in NSW primarily aim to mitigate food waste by diverting food scraps from landfill, where it decays and creates methane. The program recycles food waste into compost, where it then primarily goes into urban landscaping, sporting fields and farms to grow more food and foster a circular economy.

Independent councillor John Stamolis called the expansion a “positive thing”. 

“I think the council should be making an attempt to expand the food waste program. Council has always said that we’re going to expand that program after we’ve introduced it to all the units, that we’ll expand it to the wider community of households,” Cr Stamolis said. 

If the motion is approved, it would make the Inner West council the third Sydney inner-city council to enable the program in all dwellings, following Woollahra and Randwick. Penrith is the only other Sydney council conducting a FOGO program. 

Cr Stamolis was optimistic that the wider FOGO rollout in the Inner West would go smoothly, saying that “the key issue here is that we work with our community so we can expand it efficiently and productively in the interests of our community and in the interests of our environment”.

When councillor Kobi Shetty was asked if all five Greens councillors would vote in favour of the motion, she said that “we as a group haven’t discussed the particular motion in a lot of detail as yet, but we are supportive of FOGO rolling out to all Inner West households”. 

“I think it’s really important that we’re reducing the waste to landfill, it makes absolute sense to support it,” Cr Shetty said. 

Despite Cr Shetty’s support of the motion, she expressed underlying concerns regarding the feasibility of the expansion, saying that “some of us have concerns about the council’s ability to actually process it, which is more of a logistical issue”. 

City Hub has contacted Mat Howard for comment on the motion.

Moving forward

Discussions on how council staff will report progress towards this objective will also be included in the meeting.