Scotland looks set to miss its targets to reduce waste sent to landfill according to a new report [1] published by Audit Scotland today (Thursday 20 September).

Responding to the report Friends of the Earth Scotland's Chief Executive, Duncan McLaren, said:

"Thisreport confirms many of the concerns we have raised over the yearsabout Scotland's rising waste mountain. The priority has to be wasteprevention, something that this report only touches on.

"Wellover 60 per cent of domestic waste could be recycled or composted ifthe necessary facilities and processing plants existed. So withScotland's recycling rates at only 25 per cent there is so much morethat could be done to boost recycling.

"Onething that must be avoided is any dash by councils to burn waste.Incinerators create climate pollution, generate fewer jobs, andundermine waste prevention and recycling schemes."

Friends of the Earth Scotland is currently running a nation-wide project
aimed at helping the public reduce waste. Full details available at:
http://www.foe-scotland.org.uk/crew

ENDS

NOTES TO EDITORS:

[1] Sustainable waste management report, by the Accounts Commission for
Scotland and the Auditor General for Scotland and published by Audit
Scotland, says recycling rates have risen significantly, but further
increases will be harder to achieve and will cost more. Because of slow
progress in developing facilities to deal with waste that is not recycled it
is unlikely that Scotland will be able to reduce landfill to the levels
required by the EU. Urgent decisions now need to be made.