§ Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer asked Her Majesty's Government:
§ What is their estimate of the volume of disposable nappies entering the waste stream in the United Kingdom per year; and what resources they have allocated to reducing that volume. [HL3281]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Whitty): The Strategy Unit report Waste Not Want Not estimated that nappies comprised around 2 per cent of household waste, equivalent to 350,000 tonnes.
§ Following the publication of Waste Not Want Not the Government accepted the recommendation that the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP) should take forward (as part of an overall waste minimisation initiative) work on supporting reusable nappies through the provision of support for new businesses and information to parents.
§ The aim of the WRAP programme is to achieve an average diversion of 225kg per year per participating household. WRAP's target is to convert 155,000 households to reusable nappies by end of fiscal year 2006. This is an ambitious target and if achieved would create a reduction in household waste of 35,000 tonnes (per annum).
§ The WRAP budget for its nappies work for 2004–05 is £1.2 million.