About Us

The Scottish Waste Awareness Group (SWAG) was set up in 2000 with the remit of changing public attitudes and behaviour towards domestic waste.

One of SWAG’s key aims is to deliver the national campaign, Waste Aware Scotland*. This campaign aims to raise awareness of, and change public attitudes and behaviour towards Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. The campaign is delivered at a local level through a range of campaigning activities and in parallel with the implementation phase of the National Waste Plan for Scotland. The National Waste Plan sets targets for waste reduction and recycling, initially focusing on Municipal Solid Waste.

The Waste Aware Scotland programme has been endorsed by the Scottish Government, Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (CoSLA), and is linked to the Scottish Government’s “Do A Little Change A Lot” (DALCAL) national umbrella campaign. The programme involves developing campaigning strategies to promote individual waste reduction, reuse and recycling behaviour. The campaigns are matched to real infrastructure, such as Kerbside Recycling Services and Recycling Centres & Points, to give householders the means to take action.

The Waste Aware Scotland programme provides an opportunity to achieve consistency of approach and terminology in waste awareness throughout Scotland. SWAG is also working towards meeting the waste reduction and recycling targets set out within the National Waste Plan.

* Waste Aware Scotland is a programme of Keep Scotland Beautiful. Keep Scotland Beautiful is an operating name of Environmental Campaigns (Scotland). Scottish Charity Number SC030332. The Waste Aware Tayside campaign is funded by the Scottish Government, as part of their commitment to a Greener Scotland. To find out more, or to pledge your support, please visit www.itsourfuture.co.uk.

Please click here to find out more about how the Waste Aware Campaigns are run.

In addition to campaigning activities, SWAG is developing a range of national Waste Aware resources. Please click here to find out more about these resources and SWAG’s other Core Activities.