Sustainable Waste Management Online Guide
The former unified Municipality of Corfu, unfortunately, in previous years had not taken in time the necessary measures that would allow the efficient management of the waste produced within the island (such as the creation of infrastructure to support recycling, the raising awareness of the citizens, the transition to a circular economy, etc.), with the result that by 2018 the problem of waste management became unmanageable and caused a severe risk to both the environment and Public Health, throughout the island of Corfu. The recycle.corfu.gr is the first municipal website in the history of the island of Corfu dedicated exclusively to issues related to sustainable waste management (prevention, reuse, recycling with "Sorting at Source") but also to the available solutions offered for separate collection of the different waste streams in the Municipality of Central Corfu and Diapontia Islands.
The recycle.corfu.gr was created in the form of an easy-to-use online guide in March 2021, with the aim of being the essential digital "tool" to inform and raise awareness among citizens, offering them updated and valid information by offering answers to the following essential questions:
• Which waste streams can currently be redirected to sustainable management as well as indicative daily use materials from each waste stream?
• Why should each of them be redirected and what are the resulting profits?
• How they can reuse each of them and/or how they should prepare each material for the best practice of "Sorting at Source" while relevant educational videos are also available.
• Where can geographically, per municipal unit of the Municipality, find for each waste stream an available special bin for separate collection, using a special search tool in the "Recycling Map" field?
That will help citizens decisively reduce their failures at the critical stage of "Sorting at Source" and effectively participate in the sustainable management of their waste, continuously and steadily increasing their overall participation rates. At the same time, the Municipality will be helped with increased corresponding recycling. The recycle.corfu.gr intends to be constantly updated in terms of its content in order to inform citizens in a timely manner about all the new streams of waste that will be added in the future and that the Municipality will be able to serve.
Also, in what way will the citizens be able to properly prepare them before disposing of them in the appropriate separate collection bin so that the quantities of "clean" recyclable materials and organic waste that the Municipality can collect will continuously increase and the amounts of mixed waste that will be sent for landfilling. The website was created with the Municipality's own financial resources, while the general specifications and the design of the website, and the editing of its content have been created entirely by the Scientific Advisor to the Mayor, Mr. Victor Dimoulis.
The website recycle.corfu.gr was awarded with the «Environmental Information» award, in the category «ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS – ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION» in the context of the «GREEK GREEN AWARDS 2023» but also has been selected from the "Department of Innovation and Best Practices" of the Greek Ministry of Internal Affairs, as an innovation of the Greek Public Sector.
