Effective implementation of a marketing communications strategy for kerbside recycling: a case study from Rushcliffe, UK

Abstract

Driven by legislation, within England, the Government has set challenging, but realistic, targets to improve the management of municipal solid waste (MSW). This includes, to recycle or compost at least 25% of household waste by 2005. Additional to this, is the requirement under the EU Landfill Directive to limit the amount of biodegradable municipal waste (BMW) to be landfilled. Such targets will be very difficult to reach unless there is a rapid improvement in the recycling rate across England. To reach the targets, the majority of waste collection authorities (WCAs) will need to introduce a kerbside type collection, focussing upon key recyclates. For the kerbside scheme to deliver its intended outcome, the local population has to be effectively engaged through a well-designed communications campaign. Whilst there has been significant growth in publicity for local recycling schemes in recent years, there has been a general neglect of issues concerning public participation and the need for effective marketing communications to residents. Very little empirical research has been conducted to explore the role that marketing communications can play in influencing attitude change and recycling behaviour, determining which communication tools are considered to be most effective by local residents, the most effective scheduling of marketing communications and their cost effectiveness. Rushcliffe Borough Council is a WCA in the East Midlands of England. It decided in early 2001 to adopt a kerbside scheme in an attempt to reach statutory targets (e.g. 12% for 2003/2004). The introduction of the scheme was supported by a communications campaign, branded as recycling2go. Underlying the branded image was a detailed communications strategy, designed by a RBC expert subject team. Monitoring of recycling2go was conducted via a number of channels. A Citizens Panel survey indicated that the publicly preferred option for communication is leaflets (79%), followed by newspapers (34%) and personalised letters (33%). A relatively high proportion of residents were found to have access to the Internet at home (66%) but only 15% were prepared to use this as a communication channel with RBC. During a ‘pilot area’ survey, it was found that some 91% of respondents felt ‘satisfied’ in terms of being kept informed about the scheme. It was claimed that marketing and communications activities had ‘influenced’ some 75% of them to recycle more and newsletters (70%) were the most effective communication method. The estimated cost, above normal in-house, for the communications campaign was £56,000; at present this is difficult to compare with a wide-range of other LA campaigns as little data is available. The Borough recycling rate in 2001/2002 was 9.7%. The recycling rate during 2002/2003 in the recycling2go area was around 48%. It had reached close to 50% by December 2003, suggesting that RBC may become one of the UK’s highest performing local authorities (LAs). It can be argued that the RBC communications campaign has helped underpin the introduction of a highly successful kerbside scheme. To carry out a detailed, critical analysis would require a series of benchmarked studies by which to compare this campaign. However, such studies are, at present, relatively rare in the UK. What is apparent, is that in future all LAs must use standard communications methodology to design their campaign and this requires highly trained and competent staff—not generalists.

Introduction

Driven by legislation, within England (mirrored throughout the rest of the UK) the government has set challenging, but realistic, targets (DETR, 2000) to improve the management of municipal solid waste (MSW). These include:

• to recycle or compost at least 25% of household waste by 2005;

• to recycle or compost at least 30% of household waste by 2010.

Additional to these, is the requirement under the EU Landfill Directive (EU, 1999) to limit the amount of biodegradable municipal waste (BMW) to be landfilled (Price, 2001). These targets include:

• by 2010 no more than 75% of total of BMW produced in 1995 to be landfilled;

• by 2013 no more than 50% of total of BMW produced in 1995 to be landfilled.

These challenging targets have been set at a time when MSW arisings in the UK have been increasing, on the whole, more than 3% per annum for the last decade (DEFRA, 2003a). Data for MSW arisings and its component waste streams in England is given in Table 1. The percentage of MSW being recycled/composted increased from 12% in 2000/2001 to 13% in 2001/2002 (Table 2). In total, 22.3% of MSW had some value recovered from it in 2001/2002, a rise from 21% in 2000/2001.

For MSW in England, waste disposal is the responsibility of the Waste Disposal Authority (WDA), a County Council. Waste collection is the responsibility of the Waste Collection Authority (WCA), a District or Borough Council; this is a two-tier system (Read, 1999a). A few unitary and metropolitan authorities—and some London Boroughs—combine both functions. The Environment Agency is responsible for waste regulations.

Continuous monitoring in England, shows that whilst recycling/composting rates are increasing (Table 2), they are doing so at a rate too slow for Central Government to meet its required targets. So serious is the lack of progress that the Government tasked its Strategy Unit with a review of waste management in England (Strategy Unit, 2002). The Strategy Unit explored the serious implications of the inability of waste management practice in England to reach these targets. These include (Strategy Unit, 2002):

• EU fines of £180 million per annum;

• Waste arisings will continue to grow at a rate, greater than growth in the economy, and the cost of the transition to a more sustainable system will increase. It has been estimated that with current trends there will need to be a 100% increase by 2013.

The Government response to the Strategy Unit (DEFRA, 2003b) acknowledges the need for urgent reform and focussed action, indeed it suggests that it could take between 10–15 years to shift to a more sustainable approach. The response emphasises that to meet targets there is the requirement for increased expenditure, a raft of new practices including financial incentives and regulations and a more pro-active partnership between local authorities (LAs), industry and householders. The influential House of Commons, Environmental Audit Committee (House of Commons, 2003) has produced a scathing report that questions the ability of MSW practice in England to meet targets set in Waste Strategy 2000. It states (para 37):

Projections based on the current rates of performance improvement indicate that we will not come close to meeting any of the national targets set for recycling or recovery.

The report does stress, however, that there exists pockets of best practice where LAs have diversion rates, in some areas, of around 50% and in some cases, participation rates of 70–80% have been achieved.