One Central business wants to keep recycling, but says it is proving hard to continue to do with Wastebusters closed.

The small business, whose owner wishes to remain anonymous, said they have not managed to find someone to assist with their recycling. 

“It has been time consuming to try and find even someone to take our cardboard recycling, let alone soft plastics, polystyrene, magazines, and even some of our old e-waste.

“The council weren’t helpful in terms of giving me any providers that do business recycling in our town. 

“Losing Wastebusters is a massive loss for us as a business to reduce what is going to landfill.”

The manager said the team recycles everything they can.

“We are constantly giving our suppliers feedback on packaging and some of them have made big changes because of this. 

“We would consider not reordering based on the suppliers’ over-packaging, or [our] next option is to re-use and lastly we recycle what can be recycled now.”

Another business the Central App spoke to has spent considerable time ringing around to find a provider and this provider does not accept as many items for recycling. 

Central Otago District Council (CODC) infrastructure manager Quinton Penniall said Central businesses (on collection routes) could get additional recycling bins from the council for a fee. 

“They can get as many additional bins as they want.”

Quinton said CODC is working on pulling together a list of commercial recyclers who operate in Central and will publish it online.

He said he was shocked and upset about the closure of Wastebusters like the rest of the community.

CODC is looking at increasing offerings at CODC transfer stations, with batteries and e-waste being investigated as possibilities. 

View fees for additional CODC bins on this webpage. 

An additional 240L mixed recycling bin is $82.81 (includes GST) per year and there is a $35 bin delivery and administration charge.