Penrith celebrates 10 years of FOGO

Monday, 19 October 2020

10 years ago, Penrith City Council introduced the Food Organics Garden Organics (FOGO) service to the urban areas of Penrith. The FOGO service is best known as the community’s green-lidded bin and kitchen caddy. 

Penrith City Council was the first metropolitan council in Australia to introduce Food Organics recycling to the Garden Organics bin, further innovating the existing waste service.  

The organic material that is placed in this bin is manually sorted, turned into compost and returned to the community to be used in local parks, gardens and sports fields and onto farmlands to assist with growth and water retention in drought prone periods. 

Penrith Mayor Karen McKeown OAM said that Council was incredibly proud of the FOGO service and how residents have embraced separating FOGO over the last 10 years, encouraging them to share in the sense of pride and celebration for this achievement. 

“Penrith has never wasted a chance to do the right thing when it comes to waste management, with organics being no exception,” Cr McKeown said. 

“In 2005, we found over 30% of FOGO material was going into the red-lidded residual bin. When FOGO material goes to landfill, it releases methane gas when it breaks down, which leads to environmental issues.  

“Since starting the 3-bin system, we have seen a great reduction in the amount of FOGO material being placed in red-lidded residual bins, with our resource recovery rate increasing from 21% to 66%, meaning 66% of this can be made into a product and used as compost.

“Our community has been passionate FOGO leaders over the years and have embraced adopting our 3-bin practices. We simply can’t thank them enough for their progressive attitude and commitment to do the right thing with waste,” Cr McKeown said. 

Penrith City Council is also celebrating the rural community’s first year of the 3-bin FOGO service. 

For more information about the 3-bin FOGO service, visit penrith.city/3bins

Information contained within this news release was correct as at Monday, 19 October 2020.