<B>Toronto Aims for Higher Recycling Rate</B>

Just one day after agreeing to a C$1 billion ($663 million) plan to dump its garbage into an abandoned mine site in northern Ontario, Toronto officials are vowing to divert more of its solid waste to recycling and composting.

Toronto city council approved an agreement on Wednesday, Oct. 11 with Rail Cycle North to ship close to one million tonnes (about 1.1 million tons) of garbage of year, starting in 2002, to the Adams Mine site near Kirkland Lake, Ontario about 600 kilometers (about 373 miles) north of Toronto.

Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman told Reuters that while he's not happy with the Adams Mine deal, he believes it will give the city enough flexibility to reduce its disposable waste and redirect it to diversion and emerging technologies.

With a diversion rate of 25%, Councilor Jack Layton says that the city of 2.4 million has "one of the worst records among large cities in the developed world." Therefore, Layton is hopeful that Toronto will follow the lead of other Canadian, European and U.S. cities and work to divert more of its solid waste from landfills.

His plan, along with a group of other councilors is for Toronto to divert 78% of its 933,000 tonnes (about 1 million tons) of annual waste by the year 2007.

"We could create a lot more jobs if we did recycling and composting systems like they have in Edmonton and Halifax," Layton told Reuters. "We believe this can be done at almost the same cost as landfill, but it's environmentally so much better that we think Torontonians are going to support it."

The plan is set to be examined by city councilors, but the works committee chairman Bill Saundercook has said it's "unrealistic," saying the cost was prohibitive and would result in tax increases.

City council would likely favor a more cautious proposal by the mayor, aimed at a 50% diversion rate by 2006 and 75% rate by 2010, he said.