Did you know the Bay of Plenty doesn't have its own landfill – rubbish is trucked to Hampton Downs near Auckland every week?

And that we don't recycle number fives here in the Bay? And your coffee cups can't be recycled because of a lining of plastic; and 500 billion go to landfill annually?

In its first year the GNM achieved 93.84 per cent diversion from landfill, meaning only a little more than six per cent of the market's rubbish is rubbish. Photo: Supplied.

These eye-openers give a taste of the zero waste workshop, called Meet Up Talk Rubbish, being hosted by the Gourmet Night Markets team next Thursday night.

Markets organiser Kim Renshaw says if most people knew some things about how the region's waste disposal works they'd care a little bit more.

'These are little bits of information, not from a scary point of view, but that might be interesting for people.”

The workshop at Club Mount Maunganui from 5.45pm-7.30pm on November 27 will be hosted by Kim and zero waste inspirer Sam Gray.

Topics being covered include what does zero waste mean, how to run a zero-waste event, types of products you can compost at events like markets, an overview of the BOP waste system 'and why plastic and biodegradable plastic is uncool and glass is the bee's knees”.

'Basically, it will be a ‘how to' guide on how we can move forward to use compostable packaging out in the community,” says Kim.

'So people can expect to learn initiatives they can use if we were, to say, covert the whole of the BOP to compostable packaging, but also about the waste infrastructure in the region and how it works.”

Kim says the market's goal is to share its positive experiences with people 'and we can do this through our workshops”.

Next week's public workshop – for anyone interested in waste disposal, composting and recycling – is designed to make you think.

'It's designed not to be boring or doom and gloom – but positive, so we can find out what we can do to solve waste minimisation,” says Kim.

The market received $4165 funding from Bay of Plenty Regional Council's newly-launched Waste Resource Advisory Group to pay for three waste minimisation workshops.

In its first year the GNM achieved 93.84 per cent diversion from landfill, meaning only a little more than six per cent of the market's rubbish is rubbish. The rest is recycled.

It's one of the highest rates in NZ and definitely the highest for an ongoing event, says Kim.

'We generate all this waste in BOP and ship it off – I don't necessarily think this is bad but I think it's interesting.

'I think that we think we chuck our rubbish in a bin and a truck buries it just down the road – but it doesn't, it takes it ages away – so even understanding the way our rubbish is disposed of changes the whole way you think about waste.”

Kim wants people to head to the workshop, relax and have a discussion about waste minimisation.

'We don't know everything either, but some of the best solutions people come up with is from discussions.”

To attend the free workshop, RSVP via email to leo@gourmetnightmarket.co.nz or kim@gourmetnightmarket.co.nz