Whittle down waste in your home with some nifty ideas to eliminate the plastic liners in your bin. These ideas can be used for compost caddies and general waste alike. University of Technology Sydney has some smart and simple ideas for benchtop kitchen compost caddies. Their Wealth from Waste Living Lab, an interdisciplinary space for third-year design students, has created a series of videos showing you how to make your own liners for effective food waste management. Time to get crafty!

For a more simple technique, Live For Less Brisbane promotes a method of lining the bin with newspaper. Place newspaper sheets around the bin walls, folding the excess paper over the lip of the bin. Once you’ve worked your way around the bin walls, add some extra sheets to cover the base. You can use two pages per section to create a thicker barrier. Then to empty, take the whole bin and tip the contents, including the newspaper lining into the compost or council waste bin. Wrap any wet food scraps in newspaper before putting them in the bin, and in case of any leaks, just wash the bin out and dry it in the sun.

Diverting food waste from the kitchen bin to the compost helps to reduce the amount of greenhouse gas produced by waste that gets sent to landfill. If you’re keen to compost your food waste but don’t want to set up a bin at home, Brisbane City Council has several community composting hubs where you can take your waste. Store it in the fridge or freezer to stop mould and odours, and drop it off every week or two at your local community garden

If you rarely buy hard-copy newspapers anymore, local cafés might be able to save a few for you, and free local newspapers are usually found in abundance. Plastic liners can be a relic of the past with these nifty methods of lining the bin with paper.