Local authority municipal waste management: April to June 2022

The period April to June 2022 was at the end of the coronavirus (COVID-19) restrictions. However, historical comparisons are affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and therefore pre-pandemic comparisons have also been included.

The recycling rate is the percentage of local authority municipal waste that was reused, recycled or composted. The recycling rate has increased considerably during the last two decades (from around 5% in the late 1990s).

Main points (provisional)

July 2021 to June 2022

• 65.5% of waste was reused/recycled/composted, a slight decrease from the year ending June 2021 (which remains the highest 12 month figure on record). 

April to June 2022

• 67% of municipal waste was reused/recycled/composted, a 1 percentage point increase on the equivalent quarter in 2021 and the same percentage as the quarter in 2019. 
• 370,000 tonnes of municipal waste were generated, a 10% decrease on the same quarter of 2021 and an 8% decrease on the equivalent quarter in 2019.

These figures are based on provisional data which is published quarterly, with final data for the financial year published annually.

Notes

Data on waste management are collected in order to monitor progress towards national and local targets; in particular against the requirements of the Waste Framework Directive and the Landfill Directive. In its current waste strategy ‘Beyond Recycling’ (2021), the Welsh Government set statutory targets of recycling a minimum of 64% of waste by 2019-20, and 70% of waste by 2024-25. 

Data are sourced from the WasteDataFlow system, which is monitored by Natural Resources Wales. Quality information is available in accompanying quality report.