Composting can be pretty daunting when you literally have no idea where to start!

So let’s start at the beginning. First of all anybody can compost, whether you live in a family home, a house share or an apartment block. You don’t nesacerely need to have an outdoor space. Obviously a garden would make it a lot easier but there are companies that will take your compost waste off your hands, even if you living in the CBD.

Let’s Get Started

Composting is one of the best ways to cut down on your waste. Not only does it not produce mathane gass like when food goes to landfil, but it also makes you look at the food waste you are producing. 33.3% of all food bought from the supermarket is wasted around the world, not only does this suck because it’s bad for the environment and there are people around the world starving, but it also sucks because you are spending money of food what you aren’t consuming.

Composting is also a great way for us to not only get free soil for our gardens, but also to make sure that our top soil levels are being given the nutrients that it needs. It is predicted that ‘we have about 60 years of top soil left’, which isn’t very long, especially when it is detrimental to us producing good quality food or food at all! By producing composting soil, we are taking old nutritients and putting them back into our ground, we are '“improving soil structure, reducing compaction, and improving water retention while simultaneously improving drainage”.

How to Start Composting

Get a little bin and put it under your sink, throw any vegetable or fruit skins in the bin.

Once the bin is full you can either empty it into your giant compost bin that you have in the garden or get your compost picked up by a company similar to We Compost in your local area (this one is Auckland based)

Have a look on trademe or gumtree. We found one big compost bin on there for free and the other our flatmate made our of some old wooden timbre he found on the side of the round!

If you are dealing with your own giant compost bin at home, check out the top tips for keeping a healthy composite pile below:

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Top Tips for a Good Compost

1. Ideal balance between brown and green matter is 70/30

2. Add brown matter a few handfuls at a time as you’re adding green to avoid clumps of the all same material. A blend is key 

3. Remember to remove fruit and vege stickers 

4. Chop up green matter into small chunks (nothing thicker than your finger) this will help with quick decomposition 

5. Brown matter doesn’t have to be expensive (can even be free) collect dried leafs from your local park 

6. Keep your compost slightly moist by adding a small amount of water occasionally. Think kind of like a damp sponge

7. Turn compost with a garden fork every 2-3 weeks, or more if you’re adding lots 

8. Keep fruit flys away by the coving top fresh layer with cardboard

What Can I Compost?

Knowing what you can compost can get pretty tricky. See below what you need to keep your compost bin not only carbon rich but also nitrogen rich!

Top Tip - print out a list of what you can compost and stick it to your fridge and inside compost bin, so that every body in your house/flat can see it.

If you have any questions about composting or want to learn more, feel free to shoot us a message via @ethicallyso or hello@ethicallyso.com

Annie // Ethically So.

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