Composting

Community Composting Scheme

Community compost scheme

Starting a community composting group in Newham 

The East London Waste Authority (ELWA) and the London Borough of Newham support new community composting groups by providing funding & equipment, including: 

How Your Community Group Can Get Involved 

We're looking for active and enthusiastic community groups to join this initiative. To apply, your group should: 

  • Your project should be open to the community. People should bring materials to you, or you should collect materials from them. A regular system is vital where local communities can manage the organic waste they produce.  
  • Maintain the compost bin and its area regularly. There must be enough space to stock-pile materials, process them and compost. 
  • Appoint a lead and secondary contact. Ideally a group of volunteers can be involved with the composting. 
  • Send regular updates, such as photos of the site, number of users, share with us feedback and success stories and return the equipment if the scheme ends.

Want to lead the way in community composting?

We’re looking for constituted groups and organisations interested in setting up a composting demonstration site — an educational hub that will inspire and teach others how to compost.

Each demonstration site will be provided with several types of compost bins, showcasing a range of composting options available to residents. Host organisations will be trained as Master Composters and will deliver regular composting training events for groups and individuals in the local community, supported by us and our partner East London Waste Authority (ELWA).

This is an exciting opportunity for sites with larger outdoor spaces that would benefit from the investment of additional equipment and can make use of higher quantities of compost. We are looking for a group or organisation with a team of volunteers willing to manage the space and deliver training sessions at times that suit their availability.

Volunteers may already have some composting knowledge and a desire to develop their skills further — as well as a passion for sharing their knowledge and promoting composting within their community.

How to apply 

Want to be one of the ten new community composting hubs?

Fill out the application form

Data sharing

We may share the information you provide with our partner organisation, East London Waste Authority (ELWA). This is so they can help support, deliver, and improve this service.

Your information will only be shared where necessary, used in line with data protection legislation, and will not be used for marketing purposes.

As Newham does not have a compost collection service, all compost produced through this scheme will stay within the community - benefiting gardens, allotments, and shared green areas.

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