Swan Hill is playing a pivotal role in the drumMUSTER drive, with EnviroX Solutions, a division of the Whitfield Group, part of the growing national network of receival facilities.
Leah Whitfield says since the first drumMUSTER collection in Gunnedah in 1999, the campaign has accounted for almost 40 million drums – and that’s 7.7 million tonnes of plastic that hasn’t gone into landfill.
She says Whitfield is well on its way to 200,000 drums as its share of the 603,109 collected across all of the
Swan Hill Rural City Council area.
“The plastic finishes up in a variety of products, which help make the whole project worthwhile – from farmers cleaning their drums and delivering them to facilities such as our processing them and putting them into the system,” Leah says.
“Just a few of the products which began life as chemical containers are concrete chair bars, conduits, bollards, and general seating.
“Today drumMUSTER is funded through a product stewardship program, where 0.6 cents a litre/kilogram is added to the cost and applied at the chemical’s point of sale.”
The drumMUSTER program is specially designed for the disposal of eligible, cleaned agvet chemical containers.
DrumMUSTER collects eligible non-returnable metal or plastic containers between one litre/kilogram and 205 litre/kilogram in declared content in the packaging of crop production and animal health products used for:
- Agricultural and livestock production.
- Industrial and recreational pest and weed control.
- Forestry.
- Household pest control operations.
- Similar activities conducted by government authorities.
Participating manufacturers are identified by the inclusion of the eligible drumMUSTER container logo on their eligible containers.
The logo can be displayed on the chemical label, embossed into the container wall, or applied as a sticker to the container.
Containers not displaying this logo may be from non-participating manufacturers and will not be accepted into the program.
Leah says almost 200,000 bins has
just been a good start for EnviroX Solutions but there is a lot more to be done and she is encouraging more farmers to get on the drumMUSTER bandwagon.
Further details are available from EnviroX Solutions on 5032 9260 or drop in at 6859 Sea Lake Road, Swan Hill.
