A food scrap recycling program will begin this spring in Delta, but not all residents will be able to take part initially.

Delta council gave the green light Monday for a food waste pick-up plan that would be added to the municipality's curbside collection of yard trimmings for single-family homes. Yard trimmings and food waste will be picked up every week starting April 16.

The Green Can program will allow residents to place all cooked and uncooked food waste, including fruit, vegetables, coffee grounds and filters, teabags, meat, fish, dairy and bread, along with food-soiled paper and yard trimmings, in a lidded container at the curb for collection.

A couple of years ago, an area of Ladner participated in a six-month trial program but the results were disappointing.

"While there are clear environmental benefits associated with a food waste recycling program, participation requires a considerable shift in behavior. A communication strategy that focuses on driving behavior change is necessary to ensure the program's success," states a council report.

The report also notes that once the majority of residents are participating in the Green Can program, it is projected that up to 4,000 tonnes of food waste could be diverted from the landfill each year,

increasing Delta's single-family diversion rate to about 60 per cent.

"While this is still less than the regional target, it will move Delta amongst the leaders in singe-family waste diversion," the report adds. "Staff will continue to work with the region on other diversion programs focusing on the industrial, commercial and institutional sectors as well as the demolition, land clearing and construction sectors."

The program will result in a $10 per household increase in the solid waste portion of the annual utility bill.

Engineering director Steven Lan noted 10 Lower Mainland communities have food scrap collection programs, three of which (Port Moody, Port Coquitlam and New Westminster) have reduced their garbage pick up to every two weeks. He said Delta's weekly garbage pick up would be maintained.

Metro Vancouver's new solid waste plan sets a minimum target of 65 per cent landfill diversion by 2015 for the single-family sector and an overall 70 per cent diversion target for all sectors combined.

One of the key strategies is the collection and processing of food waste, which comprises an estimated 21 per cent of waste disposed in the region.

Council also approved a pilot project to collect food waste in a Green Bin program for multi-family housing units. It will run from July to December, but only for 200 of the thousands of multi-family units in Delta.

The region is anticipating eventually banning the disposal of food waste from the multi-family sector as well.

However, according to Delta's engineering department, the collection of food waste and yard trimmings from multi-family residents is more challenging. Containers are shared between residents and material is collected from large toter bins.

The report states before a full-scale program is considered, a pilot project is recommended to better understand how the program will work, including identifying such issues as toter storage and placement, determining the volume of material that can be collected and the number of bins required.