Curby Soft Plastics Recycling Trial - Wrap Up

 

Council’s Review of the Completed Curby Soft Plastics Recycling Trial – December 2022 to December 2024.Curby with CurbyBag

Residents in Tamworth Regional Council were one of 12 Partnering Councils with Curby, a program to recycle soft plastics conveniently at home, in an effort to prevent soft plastics from going to landfill. This initiative was particularly timely following the collapse of the REDcycle program in November 2022 that many residents utilised. The trial came at no expense to Council, or residents.

The trial was facilitated through Australian recyclers IQ Renew, who process Council’s kerbside recycling.

During the trial period Council saw the following Program Statistics:

  • Over 2,450 residents signed up to the program;
  • Over 6,000 Curby tagged bags were recovered at the MRF; and
  • Over 21.3 tonnes of material have been diverted from landfill and recycled. Given that soft plastic weighs mere grams individually, collectively, that’s a lot of soft plastic. 
  • There has been no State or National program implementation for soft plastic recycling implemented and does not appear to be anything close to being implemented since the collapse of REDcycle in November 2022.

Council was advised by IQ Renew and Curbcycle, that the Curby Trial Program was coming to a conclusion and transitioning to the new program which includes the following key features: 

  • transition to a subscriber, user pays model based on three subscription tiers, being;
    • Eco Starter, $24 per annum for 12 bags/year; 
    • Eco Warrior, $36 per annum for 18 bags/year; or 
    • Eco Hero, $48 per annum for 26 bags/year.
  • implementation of sturdier, more easily identified Curby program bags (made of recycled content). Bags are designed to be multi-purpose; and
  • phasing out the Curby tags with the QR code for scanning to utilised the Curby program bags that would have the unique QR code on them.

Council liaised with IQ Renew and Curbycycle concerns centred around cost-of-living pressures, the potential negative impacts to the number of active users and a reduction in recycling rates. 

Council considered a number of options to continue to support the community in their desire to recycle soft plastics. Council determined that it could continue to support residents with the purchase of 10,000 Curby Program bags and it would review the program again in 2026/2027. These bags are to be available from Council’s Customer Service Office for collection only. There are terms and conditions around the distribution details of the Curby Program Bags.

The CurbyIT Trial officially ceased on 30 April 2025. Please check out how to continue on with your soft plastics recycling here.