The kitchen caddy is a container with a lid that comes with your new green ‘FOGO’ bin. The kitchen caddy makes it easy to collect food scraps and to carry the scraps to your green bin.
The kitchen caddy comes tied to the handle of your bin. Cut the tie to remove the kitchen caddy from the bin and it’s ready to use when the service starts on 4 March 2024.
Keep your caddy on a kitchen benchtop, near where you prepare food. When you have finished cooking, or every other day, carry the kitchen caddy outside to your green bin and tip the food scraps in.
You can put food scraps straight into the kitchen caddy and run it through the dishwasher or wash it in the sink every now and then, to keep it clean. No liners at all are preferred, but you can use small amounts of newspaper or office paper to help transfer food to the green bin if needed.
You can also use compostable kitchen caddy liners that comply with Australian standards.
If you use compostable liners, the label must say they are certified to AS4736 (for commercial composting) to ensure the production of safe, high-quality compost.
Certified compostable liners are available at major supermarkets and some hardware stores.
Look for the seedling symbol to make sure the liner is certified and accepted in the FOGO system:
Some councils provide liners; however, this increases the cost of the service, and this cost is passed on to residents in their waste service charges. Council is not providing liners so residents can make their own decision about whether they wish to pay for liners.
Avoiding liners not only saves you money, but it also supports the transition to a circular economy, it is beneficial for the environment as it saves the resources used to produce, transport and sell the liners. It also helps avoid accidentally using the wrong liners and contaminating the contents of FOGO bins.
The wrong liners can include contaminants such as plastic and other chemical substances. These could enter our food chain if composted. To protect our farms, parks, sports fields and gardens, when the green bin collection starts on 4 March, make sure the only things that are in your green bin are food, plants and accepted liners.
For more information see the NSW EPA “FOGO information for households” at: https://www.epa.nsw.gov.au/your-environment/recycling-and-reuse/household-recycling-overview/fogo-information-for-households or visit council’s website at: https://council.lithgow.com/waste-recycling/fogo/