Minnesota Joins CVP

Earth Day marked the beginning of a statewide initiative in Minnesota designed to increase residential recycling awareness and participation in the state’s 87 counties.

The program, Recycle More Minnesota, is a multi-year agency campaign designed to increase recycling throughout Minnesota. The campaign supports the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s goal of increasing the statewide recycling rate, which is currently at 41 percent, to 50 percent by 2011. An estimated 1.3 million tons of recyclable materials are disposed of each year in Minnesota.

As part of the effort to increase recycling in the state, the Curbside Value Partnership (CVP) is working with the communities of St. Louis County, McLeod County and the Western Lake Superior Sanitary District, which represents the city of Duluth, to help drive the statewide campaign to community residents. 

“We applaud Minnesota’s efforts for creating a compelling, research-driven statewide education effort,” Steve Thompson, director of the Curbside Value Partnership, says. “We are looking forward to working with the three communities to gauge the impact of added localization.”

The CVP is an invitation-only program where the Aluminum Association and Can Manufacturer’s Institute, as well as their funding members, including Alcoa, Anheiser-Busch Metal Container, ARCO, Ball, Novelis and REXAM, collaborate with communities to help them improve participation and collection through their curbside recycling programs. Programs that are selected are then promoted nationally as best practices and serve as examples to other communities.

The CVP partnership will rely on materials created for the Recycle MORE campaign, which involves a statewide education and social marketing effort, including a movie theatre promotion, radio PSAs and multi-media toolkit of materials for local communities to use. CVP will work with the three communities to help tailor the toolkit materials and test their effectiveness.  

The state of Minnesota was selected to join CVP because of the strength of its statewide education campaign and leadership in recycling. 

For more information on the Recycle More campaign, visit www.recyclemoreminnesota.org.