Wiltshire Wildlife Trust’s Waste Prevention Manager, Eleanor Noel-Johnson, said:

“This facility is unique - not only is it the very first community composting site in Wiltshire, but it will also be run as a social enterprise, giving adults with a learning disability the opportunity to manage their own business.”

The Wiltshire Waste Partnership and Wiltshire Wildlife Trust have worked closely over the last year to build a network of community composting sites, to provide a service to local people and reduce the amount of green waste going to landfill sites.

Nearly half of everything that goes into Wiltshire’s dustbins could be composted, but most of our green waste goes straight into a landfill site.

Community composting also cuts down on the number of lorries trundling across the county transporting waste to landfill sites, so it helps ease road congestion and cuts pollution.

Partnership between the local authorities, community, Wiltshire Wildlife Trust and local business is the key to the success of this project.

Steph Peskett, manager at CARE says, “CARE’s objective is to support adults with a learning disability to increase their work skills and provide them with employment opportunities. The community composting site allows us to do this whilst fulfilling our commitment to the environment and working directly with the local community.”

Building a community composting site requires financial support and this project would not be possible without much needed funding from Wiltshire County Council, DEFRA and Viridor. Raynesway Construction Southern (RCS) provided the labour and 100 per cent recycled aggregate to create a high quality work area, Wilkins Builders the wood to build the compost bays and B&Q (Trowbridge) a storage shed.

The Care about Compost site is now ready to take the seasonal collection of garden clippings and cuttings that by next year will be rich compost, mulching the flowerbeds and borders of local gardens.