Throwing your finely cleaned chicken bone into a different bin is nothing new.

Home composting kitchen waste is a long-standing method – albeit a smelly one – by which gardeners produce organic food for their plants and soil.

Home composting is also a way to reduce household waste and according to an Open University study, household waste composting is on the rise.

Currently, three waste composting methods exist and are encouraged by the government’s waste reduction campaign, ‘Love Food Hate Waste.’

Households may either compost the green waste themselves using a garden heap, leave the green waste (not including food waste) out for their local authority to pick up and compost, or deposit the waste at a Civic Amenities site.
The use of composting has more than halved average waste in dustbins since 2000; with the proportion of households participating in waste composting increasing from 60 per cent in 2002 to 80 per cent in 2008, found Open University researchers.

The Open University’s detailed study – commissioned by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) – revealed the proportion of waste composting households to partly be the result of an increased participation in putrescible kitchen waste home composting and more homes being served by kerbside waste collection.

A rose full of home compost nutrients blooms in a garden.

Researchers noted an increase of household putrescible kitchen waste composting from 27 per cent in 2002 to 43 per cent in 2008, though, the recorded six-year rise in kitchen waste composting has not contributed to the category’s decrease in overall dustbin waste.
In 2008, kitchen waste still contributed 44.6 per cent of dustbin waste, found researchers. Researchers have linked the lack of kitchen composting to property type.

“Those living in flats are far less likely to participate in composting then those in other types of housing,” said Open University researchers.
The fact remains: people have composted, people are composting, and people will continue to compost.

Putrescible kitchen waste may not be the trendiest household waste to compost – it being smelly kitchen waste – but it is do-able. All you need is a smell-free compost bin, a whole grilled chicken – unless you’re vegetarian, hungry plants, and will power!

Want to start composting at home? Purchase a smell-free Bokashi compost bin from our online shop.