Welcome to the Australian Local Food System Policy Database. This is a collection of policies from New South Wales (NSW) and Victorian local governments that relate to healthy, sustainable, and equitable food systems.
For further information about using the database and how it was created see How to use the database. You can search the database by using the fields below. Domain refers to eight broad categories under which various topics are situated. The domains and topics are based on a framework of recommendations for local government action on creating a healthy, sustainable, and equitable food system (also located on the ‘How to use the database’ page linked above).
To cite the database: Reeve B, Carrad A, Rose N, Charlton K & Aguirre-Bielschowsky I (2021) Australian Local Food System Policy Database. Available at: https://law-food-systems.sydney.edu.au/policy-database (access date).
Suggested search terms
Hold Ctrl to select multiple terms. Using ‘any words’ functions as an “OR” search. Using ‘all words’ functions as and “AND” search.
Search Criteria:
| Document title | Relevant text in the policy | Domain | Topic | State | Local Government name | Council type |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | develop, promote and provide information and education on food waste avoidance and reduction through focussed programs and workshops promote varied home composting systems and provide training in their use, as the preferred way to manage unavoidable food waste | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | develop, promote and provide information and education on food waste avoidance and reduction through focussed programs and workshops promote varied home composting systems and provide training in their use, as the preferred way to manage unavoidable food waste | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | For these reasons, the preferred approaches to managing food and garden wastes from households are: Avoid and Reduce – Council will conduct community programs and training to promote avoidance and reduction of food waste by shopping more strategically, meal planning, storage and preparation strategies and improved cooking management and other techniques. Council will provide information on good management practices for low waste gardens. | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Provide information, seminars, workshops, training, service advice, support and access to home compost systems. | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Tackling issues around food waste through: active promotion of avoidable food waste reduction including developing education strategies and projects active promotion of at home food waste management (eg: waste avoidance, composting) | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Avoid and Reduce – Council will conduct community programs and training to promote avoidance and reduction of food waste by shopping more strategically, meal planning, storage and preparation strategies and improved cooking management and other techniques. Council will provide information on good management practices for low waste gardens. Reuse – Council will conduct community programs, information sessions, training and promotion of home composting and worm-farming Community surveys (see Figure 11) show that around 40% of households use home composting or worm-farming and a further 10% intend to use these within the next 1-5 years. Despite this, around 40% of Darebin kerbside waste is compostable food and garden waste, which highlights significant opportunities for improvement. Food and green waste composted at home can be re-used on garden beds on site. | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Avoid and Reduce – Council will conduct community programs and training to promote avoidance and reduction of food waste by shopping more strategically, meal planning, storage and preparation strategies and improved cooking management and other techniques. Council will provide information on good management practices for low waste gardens. Reuse – Council will conduct community programs, information sessions, training and promotion of home composting and worm-farming Community surveys (see Figure 11) show that around 40% of households use home composting or worm-farming and a further 10% intend to use these within the next 1-5 years. Despite this, around 40% of Darebin kerbside waste is compostable food and garden waste, which highlights significant opportunities for improvement. Food and green waste composted at home can be re-used on garden beds on site. | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Food makes up a large proportion of waste. In Darebin and across Melbourne it makes up at least 35-40% by weight of waste. In Darebin, food waste is around 38% by weight and almost all of this food waste (92%) is home compostable. This high proportion of food in waste is despite Council promoting at home management of food by providing discounted compost bins, worm-farms and Bokashi Buckets and over 40% of Darebin households reporting that they use compost bins or worm-farms. | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Home Composting Systems Council offers affordable compost bins, compost aerators, worm farms and Bokashi buckets for sale year-round at Customer Service Centres and runs an annual Spring discount period. | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Many ongoing internal waste avoidance, reuse, composting and recycling education events, information sessions and awareness raising activities and promotion is also run by the Environment and Natural Resources Team. | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | promotion of home composting and worm-farming and expanding the options available (ongoing) | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Provide information, seminars, workshops, training, service advice, support and access to home compost systems. | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Reuse – Council will conduct community programs, information sessions, training and promotion of home composting and worm-farming Community surveys (see Figure 11) show that around 40% of households use home composting or worm-farming and a further 10% intend to use these within the next 1-5 years. Despite this, around 40% of Darebin kerbside waste is compostable food and garden waste, which highlights significant opportunities for improvement. Food and green waste composted at home can be re-used on garden beds on site. Recycle -Where materials cannot be managed on site, Council will provide an optional fee for service fortnightly kerbside green waste recycling service for recyclable garden waste. When the green waste recycling facility can accept it, Council will investigate using this service for clean compostable food waste. Recover and Dispose – Council will continue to use landfills with best practice landfill management with landfill gas energy recovery and leachate management systems to minimise environmental impacts and recover energy. | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | strategies and projects active promotion of at home food waste management (eg: waste avoidance, composting) investigation of potential alternative food waste recycling – options high levels of landfill gas energy recovery and ongoing environmental risk management. | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | promote varied home composting systems and provide training in their use, as the preferred way to manage unavoidable food waste | Sustainability and Environment | Home and community gardening | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | continue to advocate and work with other councils and MWRRG for regional green waste recycling facilities that have the capacity to process current and projected volumes of garden waste and expand to incorporate food waste | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Council engages and involves staff across the organisation to improve its response to waste and litter issues. The Environment Action Team (EAT) was established as a staff steering group to implement environmental actions and workplace sustainability changes across the organisation. Each work area has an Environmental Champion who helps support and promote EAT initiatives in their teams as well as providing and feeding back environmental information. Staff are also encouraged to participate in a broad range of public environmental and Sustainable Homes events. Over 40% of Council staff are Darebin residents. Many ongoing internal waste avoidance, reuse, composting and recycling education events, information sessions and awareness raising activities and promotion is also run by the Environment and Natural Resources Team. | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Council will monitor performance against the following parameters: total and per capita tonnes of landfilled waste from kerbside collections total and per capita tonnes of kerbside recycling total and per capita tonnes of kerbside green waste recycling the proportions by weight/volume of recyclables and compostable garden and food waste in waste bins as shown by periodic kerbside waste bin audits (where funded) the proportion by weight of contaminants in the recycling and green waste recycling services (where information is available) the proportion by weight of hard waste sent to landfill | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | develop, promote and provide information and education on food waste avoidance and reduction through focussed programs and workshops promote varied home composting systems and provide training in their use, as the preferred way to manage unavoidable food waste | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Food makes up a large proportion of waste. In Darebin and across Melbourne it makes up at least 35-40% by weight of waste. In Darebin, food waste is around 38% by weight and almost all of this food waste (92%) is home compostable. This high proportion of food in waste is despite Council promoting at home management of food by providing discounted compost bins, worm-farms and Bokashi Buckets and over 40% of Darebin households reporting that they use compost bins or worm-farms. | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | For these reasons, the preferred approaches to managing food and garden wastes from households are: Avoid and Reduce – Council will conduct community programs and training to promote avoidance and reduction of food waste by shopping more strategically, meal planning, storage and preparation strategies and improved cooking management and other techniques. Council will provide information on good management practices for low waste gardens. Reuse – Council will conduct community programs, information sessions, training and promotion of home composting and worm-farming Community surveys (see Figure 11) show that around 40% of households use home composting or worm-farming and a further 10% intend to use these within the next 1-5 years. Despite this, around 40% of Darebin kerbside waste is compostable food and garden waste, which highlights significant opportunities for improvement. Food and green waste composted at home can be re-used on garden beds on site. Recycle -Where materials cannot be managed on site, Council will provide an optional fee for service fortnightly kerbside green waste recycling service for recyclable garden waste. When the green waste recycling facility can accept it, Council will investigate using this service for clean compostable food waste. Recover and Dispose – Council will continue to use landfills with best practice landfill management with landfill gas energy recovery and leachate management systems to minimise environmental impacts and recover energy. | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Home Composting Systems Council offers affordable compost bins, compost aerators, worm farms and Bokashi buckets for sale year-round at Customer Service Centres and runs an annual Spring discount period. | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | On average each Darebin household‟s waste bin is comprised of over 40% of food and garden waste by weight, with food contributing about 173kg of food waste per household per year | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | promote waste reduction actions that reduce common litter items such as plastic shopping bags and beverage containers | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | promotion of home composting and worm-farming and expanding the options available (ongoing) | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Provide information, seminars, workshops, training, service advice, support and access to home compost systems. | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Reduce food in landfilled kerbside waste | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy 2015-2025 | Tackling issues around food waste through: active promotion of avoidable food waste reduction including developing education strategies and projects active promotion of at home food waste management (eg: waste avoidance, composting) investigation of potential alternative food waste recycling – options high levels of landfill gas energy recovery and ongoing environmental risk management. | Food Waste | Food losses and food waste | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy ACTION PLAN 2017-2020 | Conduct community programs, information sessions, training and promotion of home composting and wormfarming as the preferred way to manage unavoidable food waste. | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |
| Darebin Waste and Litter Strategy ACTION PLAN 2017-2020 | Develop education strategies, promote and provide information and education on food waste avoidance and reduction through focussed programs and workshops. | Health and Wellbeing | Education/events on food system issues | Victoria | Darebin | Metropolitan |