Dear Editor,
In 2008, the provincial government passed a bill entitled, Environment Quality Act, the purpose of which was to make public the government policy on residual materials management. According to section 7.4 of section 53.4 (chapter 2) called . . .
“Ban the disposal of organic materials,” it says “… at the same time the government wants to ensure that waste material diverted from disposal sites is handled in such a way as to maximize its value. Leaving grass clippings in place and household or community composting, both of which reduce at source the amount of putriscible organic materials should be encouraged first. Non-putrescible organic material such as paper cardboard and wood should preferably be returned to the production cycle for these materials rather than used for energy reclamation, including energy production.”
In July this year, the government came out with the ACDC program (Google translated from French) “funding guidelines for managing home and community composting programs ” run by RECYC QUEBEC with a recently added $5 million to its existing $2 million dollar budget. Municipalities have until August 2022 to submit their plans with approval by December 2022.
It has three phases; home and small group composting comes first, followed by those for bigger dwellings with special digesters and lastly home pick up service by trucks with larger processing facilities. The underlying rationale is that people be responsible for their own garbage from big industry down to the individual and not hand it off to someone else. It reflects the decision “polluter pays first.” We will benefit from a useful product for gardens and we will be paying less to have it processed, if we keep it simple as the government only kicks in 80 per cent of the recycling budget. There is provision to share the costs between communities for the small biodigesters for those who can’t compost and things that can’t be composted. Let’s do our part for a healthier community and let your municipalities know your preference for composting at home.
Cathy Fox
Bryson, Que.
References:
Quebec residual materials management policy Environment Quality Act (chapter Q-2,s.53-.4)7.4
Juillet 2020-RECYC-Quebec- Programme Aide au compostage domestique etcommunitaire
