Food & Wet Waste Removal in Sydney

Food waste is the reason bins smell. Everything else is just rubbish. Wet organic waste breaks down fast, leaks into the bottom of the bin, and leaves a residue that keeps smelling long after the waste is gone. It’s also what attracts flies, cockroaches and rodents.

Where wet waste causes the most trouble

School and workplace kitchens, sporting club canteens, council and community facilities, apartment bin rooms, and any household over a summer weekend.

Why emptying the bin isn’t enough

Once organic residue has dried into the base and walls of a bin, emptying it changes nothing — the smell and the breeding site stay. That residue is what a high-pressure clean and sanitise actually removes, which is why food-waste-heavy sites need bin cleaning on a schedule rather than as a one-off.

Does food go in your green bin? It depends where you live

This is the single most confused question in Sydney waste right now, because the answer changed recently in some suburbs and hasn’t changed at all in others. Getting it wrong is not harmless — on the Northern Beaches, food in a garden-organics bin is contamination, and a contaminated load can be sent to landfill in its entirety.

Yes, food goes in the green bin:

Randwick — the green-lid bin is a full FOGO bin taking garden waste plus all food scraps, collected weekly, houses and apartments alike.
Woollahra — green bin takes food scraps including meat, seafood, bones, dairy and bread, collected weekly, apartments included.

Yes, but in a separate bin — not the green one:

Lane Cove — a maroon-lid food waste bin collected weekly. Stand-alone houses only for now; townhouses and units can register interest from February 2027.
City of Sydney — an opt-in maroon-lid food scraps bin, mostly in apartment buildings, with more than 22,000 households signed up. The green bin stays garden-only and fortnightly.

Not yet — trials and pilots running:

Northern Beaches — a pilot of around 3,000 households. Phase 2 runs April to September 2026 in Terrey Hills, Manly Vale and Fairlight using a burgundy bin. Outside the pilot, food in the green bin is contamination.
Waverley — a trial that began in October 2024 and expanded in 2025, with a council-wide rollout planned for 2027.

No food organics service: North Sydney, Mosman, Hornsby, Ku-ring-gai and Willoughby. In these areas food scraps go in the red bin. Ku-ring-gai’s green bin label says “garden vegetation only — no food scraps”, and Hornsby lists food waste explicitly as not permitted.

Every NSW council has to offer a food organics service by 1 July 2030 under the state mandate, so the ones on the “no” list will change. Check your own council before assuming.

The separate mandate for larger sites

From July 2026 the NSW food organics mandate begins applying in stages to large food-waste generators, including clubs, hospitals and aged care facilities. Where it applies, food organics must be separated and collected at least weekly, and the obligation sits with the building complex manager or owner rather than an individual tenant.

If you manage a site in that group, separating the food stream also changes what the bins themselves need. Bins holding separated food organics need cleaning more often, not less — the waste is wetter and the residue heavier.

What we do

Remove accumulated food and wet waste where it exceeds bin capacity.
Clean and sanitise the bin afterwards so the residue goes with it.
Set up a recurring schedule for sites that generate wet waste continuously.

What we don’t do

We service strata, residential, council and government sites, schools and childcare, sporting grounds and facilities. We don’t service cafés, restaurants or hospitality venues — that’s a different kind of trade waste contract and there are operators set up for it.