11 Nov. 2024: Wales continues to outperform the rest of the UK on household recycling, figures for 2023-24 from the Welsh Government have revealed. It has been ranked in Eunomia’s global recycling league table as falling only behind Austria.

The average recycling rate for Welsh councils increased from 65.7% the previous year to 66.6% in 2023-24. Recycling rates varied from 60.1% in Cardiff to 72.8% in Bridgend.
Residual household waste per person decreased by 2.1%, from 2022-23 to 168kg.

Eighteen of the 22 local authorities met the statutory target of recycling at least 64% in 2023-24. The four that did not were Cardiff, Caerphilly, Flintshire and Wrexham.

Six authorities have already met the 2024-25 statutory target of 70%. They are Bridgend, Pembrokeshire, Ceredigion, Swansea, Carmarthenshire and Vale of Glamorgan.

Wales is the only country in the UK with a household recycling rate higher than 50%.

Defra data published before the Welsh government’s figures show that England is the only UK nation whose household recycling rate is going down, falling from 44.3% to 43.4% between 2015 and 2022. Labour’s circular economy minister, Mary Creagh, greeted the news as “deeply disappointing’’.

The has been a significant decrease in the proportion of waste disposed to landfill in Wales, falling from 42% in 2012-13 to just 0.9% in 2023-24.

The proportion of waste disposed of for energy from waste rose from 4.7% in 2012-13 to 31.3% in 2023-24.

Household waste accounts for almost 90% all municipal waste collected, therefore changes in household recycling rates have a greater impact on the overall recycling rate than in non-household recycling.

In Wales, segregated collection is the norm. Commingled materials accounted for only 17.4% of all waste collected for reuse recycling or composting.

A third of all material collected for reuse, recycling and composting in 2023-24 was organic, including food and garden waste.

Just 6.9% of waste collected was classified was plastic or metal’ which make up the lowest proportion of naterial collected.

The Welsh Government set statutory targets for recycling in its current waste strategy ‘Beyond Recycling’ (2021). The Welsh figures were sourced from the WasteDataFlow system, which is monitored by Natural Resources Wales.

By Will Hatchett, Materials Recycling World