Children get creative to curb food waste

Artwork drawn by two eight year-old students from Mile Cross Primary School is now on the side of Norwich City Council’s new food waste vehicles, after they won a competition to promote the importance of recycling unwanted food.

Year four students, Lyla Donovan and Loris Yallop, were joint winners of the competition and were the first to see their drawings on the recycling vehicles when they turned up at their school.

Loris Yallop said "I was completely speechless when I found out that I'd won the competition. Recycling is important because it means you can use something again and again."

Lyla Donovan said: "We recycle our food waste at home so I wanted to encourage other to use their food caddy too. I was so surprised to learn I had won - it felt great!"

Councillor Kendrick, Norwich City Council cabinet member with responsibility for recycling, judged the competition. 

“Many of the drawings showed real insight into the issues of food waste and so much creativity had gone into illustrating the ideas. It was hard to choose a winner, so in the end we chose two!

“I hope seeing the posters on the food waste trucks will remind residents of the importance of minimising food waste, and of using their kitchen caddy for unavoidable leftovers.”

As part of its drive to increase recycling, Norwich City Council started up a free weekly food waste collection service in 2010 which is now available to most residents, as well as city schools.

Norwich City Council hopes seeing the children's posters on the food recycling trucks will help encourage all residents to use the free food recycling service, or compost their leftovers. No food at all should go into rubbish or blue recycling bins.