Farmers in Alberta use about 2,000 tonnes of grain bags and approximately 2,200* tonnes of plastic baler twine annually. These plastic tools are essential in today’s farming operations—grain bags to temporarily store harvested grains, and twine to bind crops for storage and transport. But managing these plastics after use has been challenging for many farmers.
That’s changing under a pilot program called ‘Alberta Ag Plastic. Recycle It!’
The pilot has been developed in Alberta for Alberta farmers. It offers a solution to manage the materials environmentally, giving farmers options to operate their farms sustainably.
From the start of the ‘Recycle It!’ pilot in October 2019 and continuing through December 2022, farmers have brought close to 2,270 tonnes of grain bag plastic and over 336 tonnes of used plastic baler twine to designated collection locations for recycling. For grain bags, that’s equal to 126 semi-trailers full of rolled up grain bags, lined up end to end for two km. The twine collected for recycling equates to the amount that would be used to wrap 922,000 large square hay bales.
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