Te Āhua o te Para i Aotearoa

State of Waste in Aotearoa

The data behind the design system. Figures are drawn from public reporting by the Ministry for the Environment, Local Government NZ, WasteMINZ, Auckland Council, and the OECD. Every statistic is cited; the underlying reports are linked at the foot of the page.

Production

781kg

waste per capita per year

OECD Environmental Performance Reviews, 2023

35%

increase in municipal waste per capita, 2010–2018

OECD (versus 3% OECD average)

~17.49M

tonnes of waste generated annually

Ministry for the Environment, 2023

Recycling

~35%

of waste recycled or reused

Ministry for the Environment

~12%

kerbside contamination rate, Auckland

Auckland Council

materials accepted at kerbside nationally

Kerbside standardisation, February 2024

Infrastructure

territorial authorities

Local Government NZ

councils with no kerbside collection

WasteMINZ

50%

of landfill waste is construction and demolition

Ministry for the Environment

Policy

2024

kerbside recycling standardisation

Ministry for the Environment

2026

new waste legislation expected

Waste Minimisation Act replacement

EPR

Extended Producer Responsibility incoming

MfE Waste Work Programme

Notes on methodology

Per-capita figures use the OECD's municipal solid waste definition, which differs from the Ministry for the Environment's disposal-to-landfill metric. Where totals diverge, the OECD figure is preferred for cross-country comparison and the MfE figure for domestic trend analysis.

Kerbside contamination is published by a handful of councils and is not aggregated nationally. Auckland's figure is cited as the most consistently reported; rural and Waikato-region rates are believed to be higher, but data is partial.

All figures are refreshed against public sources at release. If you find an error or a newer citation, the site is open source and corrections are welcome.

Sources

Ministry for the Environment — Waste Work Programme
OECD Environmental Performance Reviews: New Zealand, 2023
Global Waste Index, 2025
Te Rautaki Para — NZ Waste Strategy 2023
WasteMINZ — Standardisation Guidelines
Auckland Council — Kerbside Contamination Report
NZ Infrastructure Commission — Circular Economy Report
Local Government NZ — Territorial Authority Register

Anchor

Materials have value. Say goodbye properly.

The numbers above describe a system that still treats recoverable material as rubbish. A national standard for how we communicate about waste is the low-cost, high-leverage correction.