What can be recycled?
transportation.
This year, Kapitan and her family have salvaged plastic egg-shaped packaging from the year before to make new ‘‘eggs’’ filled with stickers and other treats .
Standing in the grocery store deciding what Easter treats to buy, she realised what was most important was how her kids felt.
Making Easter eggs at home, baking hot-cross buns and buying winter clothes instead of chocolate was less wasteful, and also healthier, she said.
‘‘If we can find a way of being sustainable and fun, then we’re recreating that sense of tradition. [Easter] is deep in our hearts, it’s a memory and it’s a way that we feel that we’re trying to replicate.’’
Father-of-three Caleb Carnie said every year his family made the effort to buy New Zealandmade Easter egg foil
In Wellington and Christchurch, no. In Auckland, maybe – but only if it’s clean and not rolled too small. Easter egg boxes
Cardboard packaging around Easter eggs can be recycled but not soft-plastic wrapping – and New Zealand currently has no soft-plastic recycling collections.
Hot-cross bun bags
No, if you can scrunch plastic in your hand, then it is a ‘‘soft plastic’’ and cannot be recycled.
chocolate and wrap homemade Easter eggs in baking paper.
The baking and wrapping involved RICKY WILSON/STUFF the kids, and was better for the environment, he added.
The Warehouse Group chief sustainability officer David Benattar said some packaging was necessary to prevent damage to eggs and one of its major stockists, Waikato Valley Chocolate, had reduced its Easter packaging to save waste. ‘‘We encourage people to dispose of their Easter egg packaging thoughtfully.’’
A Whittaker’s spokeswoman said the foil from its chocolate Easter kiwi could be recycled through regular aluminium recycling schemes.
EarthSavvy founder Kristy Lorson said the country should be consuming less plastic. Easter was not as wasteful as Christmas but was still problematic, she said.
‘‘The good news, however, is that Easter waste is easily avoided.’’