By Alice McFarlane

Grain bag recycling ‘open for business’ in Saskatchewan

Nov 1, 2021 | 3:29 PM

MELFORT, Sask. – Now that farmers have completed harvest, it’s a good time to be thinking about repurposing those used grain bags.

Cleanfarms runs the recycling programs. Executive Director Barry Friesen said for producers who have been emptying grain bags this fall or cleaning out bags from previous years, the recycling collection sites are available across the province.

There are 44 collection sites stretching from Meadow Lake in the northwest to Carievale in the southeast. A number of new locations are now open around Regina, Biggar, and Preeceville.

Friesen said the new sites make it more convenient for producers to get to a collection location. Some of the sites also have grain bag rollers available to enable producers to prepare the bags on site for recycling.

“Our network of collections sites, along with the logistics, loading, shipping and program management are all Saskatchewan-based which adds to the local economy while at the same time, doing the important job of collecting used plastics for recycling,” Friesen said.

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While the growing season has been challenging in many ways, Cleanfarms reported that so far this year, producers have returned more than 2,055 tonnes of grain bags for recycling.

Saskatchewan had the first-of-its-kind agricultural recycling program established under the province’s Agricultural Packaging Product Waste Stewardship Regulations. When it started in 2018, it was the only government-regulated extended producer responsibility program of its kind in Canada.

Collecting used grain bags in Saskatchewan is growing year over year. In 2018, Cleanfarms recovered 1,257 tonnes of grain bags. In 2020, Saskatchewan farmers doubled this, returning 2,536 tonnes of grain bags for recycling.

Manitoba is now set up to recover grain bags and baler twine and Cleanfarms is operating pilots to collect information on recovery patterns in Alberta.

Cleanfarms’ research estimates that Canadian farmers use nearly 62,000 tonnes of ag plastic products and packaging each year. More than half of that, about 53 per cent, is generated on the prairies.

The program has progressed significantly over the past four years. The collection rate in Saskatchewan in 2020 represented 63 per cent of the material that was available.

“We have Saskatchewan producers to thank for that along with our 44 collection partners,” Friesen said. “We are very grateful they are continuing to participate so enthusiastically in this recycling program.”

Recycled grain bags are used to make new products such as plastic construction sheet products and industrial garbage bags.

Cleanfarms also manages several other agricultural products including small pesticide and fertilizer containers and jugs, recycling large non-deposit plastic totes and drums for pesticides and fertilizers, and collects and disposes of unwanted pesticides as well as old, obsolete livestock and equine medications.

It also runs a disposal program for seed and pesticide bags in eastern Canada and fertilizer bags in Quebec.

There are a number of pilot projects underway from British Columbia to Prince Edward Island that are collecting data on how to recover and recycle used plastic bale and silage wrap, baler twine and bunker covers.

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alice.mcfarlane@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @farmnewsNOW