Social Investment Scotland has awarded five Scottish social enterprises almost £156,000 raised through Asda’s five pence carrier bag charge.

Bunzl Catering Supplies, Benders Paper Cups and BASIS have joined the Simply Cups paper cup recycling service, which now includes five additional materials.

FareShare has launched an eight-step Food Efficiency Framework to help businesses identify and redistribute surplus food in order to reduce waste arisings.

The European Parliament Environment Committee has voted through a draft report on the circular economy, which calls on the European Commission to increase recycling targets to ‘at least’ 70 per cent.

Environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy is launching its Centre for Social Innovation to develop new approaches to solving litter and waste problems.

The European Commission has launched a consultation on ‘the nature and the extent of regulatory failures causing undue distortions to EU waste markets for recycling and recovery’.

Liz Goodwin has been recognised with an OBE ‘for services to Business Resource Efficiency and the Environment’ in the Queen’s Birthday Honours 2015.

Bristol City Council has announced that it has ‘mutually agreed’ with its waste contractor Kier to terminate the current waste collection and street cleansing contract.

The Plastics 2020 consortium has announced it will launch the Plastics Industry Recycling Action Plan (PIRAP) at the Plastics Recycling Expo (PRE) in Telford.

Plans by Peel Environmental to develop a £65-million Timber Resource Recovery Centre in Barnsley have been given the green light by Barnsley Council.