INDUSTRY INSIGHT
Everyone must take ownership
Rick Ralph says typical landfills require management for up to 30 years after a closure.
WASTE RECYCLING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION NORTHERN TERRITORY CEO RICK RALPH SHARES HIS VIEWS ON THE CURRENT STATE OF THE REGION’S WASTE MANAGEMENT AND RESOURCES INDUSTRY.
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he Northern Territory’s (NT) Waste Management and Secondary Resources Industry provides waste collection processing, recycling and disposal infrastructure and services to the community. It recovers valuable secondary resources generated during extraction and manufacturing processes of those wastes discarded by society, recovering where practical for recycling secondary products. It provides more than 744 local jobs, directly
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contributing more than $54 million in industry value add towards the Territory’s economy. There are more than 30 businesses operating, collecting more than 560,000 tonnes of waste and recyclables with a current diversion rate of about 35 per cent. Indirectly it provides an additional 625 jobs, contributing an additional $43 million per annum to the NT economy. Recent headlines with respect to government’s investigations of a waste levy have certainly sparked community
debate. These conversations are long overdue and must not be ring-fenced to a single subject. Central to that conversation must be an acceptance by everyone that responsibility for waste and its future management reforms is not left singularly to governments or the waste management industry. We all share responsibility. As debate occurs, a default position commonly taken is to argue ‘why we can’t do something’ rather than
