Council scoops prestigious Green Award 2009

SOUTH Oxfordshire District Council has scooped a prestigious ?2009 Green Award? for its communications campaign that helped launch its new recycling and refuse service.

The award in the category for ?Best Green Direct Mail? was announced at a ceremony in London on Wednesday 18 November. The Green Awards recognise and reward creative work that communicates the importance of sustainable development and ethical best practice. The council?s campaign also reached the shortlist for Best Green Public Sector Campaign.

The council won the award for the series of information leaflets provided to residents in the run-up to the new waste service launched in June 2009. The leaflets were designed and produced by Ferrier Pearce Creative Group, working closely with the council, the Vale of White Horse District Council?s communications team, and waste contractor Verdant.

Judges commended the campaign for its use of environmentally-friendly material and said: “South Oxfordshire District Council delivered a
pack with engaging, clear and concrete information regarding what to recycle, and how, to 60,000 households. As a result, they moved from
being 124th on the UK Local Authority recycling register to one of the best in England.”

David Dodds, South Oxfordshire District cabinet member for waste, said:?We always strive for excellence and it is good to see this reflected
in the award. We fully appreciated our new service was a big change for all our residents, and so our challenge was to help them through this
transition by providing clear, easy-to-follow information on how the new scheme would work.

“We can?t thank residents enough for producing such a stunning performance following the launch of the collection service. Our recycling and composting rate nearly doubled, making us one of the best performing districts in England.”

Jonathon Porritt CBE, Programme Director of Forum for the Future and Chairman of the UK Sustainable Development Commission, said of all the award winners: “In a world of imploding certainties and deepest doom and gloom, we need more than ever to be celebrating the work of those who are already building that better, more sustainable world that is emerging from the chaos – and that?s exactly what the Green Awards are all about.”