Cane growers have been doing it with chemical drums now it’s time to recycle cane fertiliser bags.

It’s estimated more than 350,000 one tonne bags and 2,000,000 25kg bags are used by the sugarcane industry each year. While some are returned, most are dumped, burned or piled up on farms.

So a trial recycling program for polypropylene cane fertiliser bags is up and running with collection points including the Killaloe Waste Station in the Douglas Shire open until mid-December. Farmers are being asked to roll up, tie off and deliver their used bags free of charge.

The bags will then be collected by processors and recyclers. One of the key objectives of the trial is to demonstrate the feasibility of the program and to build support for it to become an ongoing feature of the sugarcane farming process.

The trial is being run by Farm Waste Recovery with support from regional councils, the Queensland Government through the Department of Environment and Heritage Protection, fertiliser bag manufactures Incitec Pivot Limited and Impact Fertilisers and grower organisation CANEGROWERS.

The trial will operate in a similar manner to the successful drumMUSTER and ChemClear programs.

Farm Waste Recovery Managing Director Stephen Richards says farmers are being asked to drop off fertiliser bags rolled up.

“This is to help ensure that the bags are easier to handle and are less prone to being blown around the sites in the event of strong winds,” he said.

“If the bags can’t be rolled, they need to be stacked flat or stuffed inside one another.”

DrumMUSTER has collected and recycled over 26 million AgVet containers (31 million kilograms of plastic) and ChemClear has collected over 500 tonnes of unwanted AgVet chemicals.

Mr Richards hopes that once the volume of available fertiliser bag material is realised through the trial, it will act as an incentive for expanded processing efforts. Used plastics can be used to make items including fence posts and outdoor furniture.