Tauranga residents are being encouraged to compost their food scraps at home.

While the Tauranga City Council doesn't provide a service, it leases land to Revital to undertake composting at the Te Maunga resource recovery park.

Waste minimisation programme leader Kimberley Cleland says Tauranga doesn't currently have a kerbside collection, they do have a centralised collection at the transfer station.

She says composting facility for difficult organic materials such as kitchen and food scraps.

'We encourage households to compost their food scraps at home to keep them from going to the landfill,” she says.

'Composting is a simple and effective step to reducing the amount of household rubbish going to landfills and reusing a valuable resource.”

Kimberley says around half of households rubbish can be attributed to organic waste and organic waste has a relatively high environmental effect when buried.

'There are many systems available for removing organic waste at a household level including composting and worm composting.”

Tauranga City Council runs a home worm composting programme twice a year in March and August.

This programme is subsidised and allows households to start worm composting for a nominal fee.

'The workshop is a two-hour afternoon session which teaches the basics of worm composting or vermi-composting,” says Kimberley.

'Participants receive their own worm bin and worms so they can go home and get started straight away.”

Participants will also learn how to harvest the compost or ‘vermicast' to use on gardens as a beneficial plant food and soil conditioner.

It will take around three months to fill the first layer in the bin and around four to six months until there is enough vermicast to use in the garden.

'A master vermi-composter programme runs adjacent to the workshop to give community-based support for household who are just starting out with worm composting,” says Kimberley.

'Master vermi-composters are people who have had their own household worm compost systems and can help beginners identify any issues.”

Tauranga City residents can register for the next workshop in March 2012 by calling the Tauranga City Council office.