East Hampshire residents are among the greenest in the country, new figures have confirmed.

This week it was reported that East Hampshire District Council is the top recycling area in the whole of the county and one of top five districts in England.

At Tuesday's north east area community committee meeting, Mark Reed, strategic manager of the Waste To Resources Action Plan, reported that the rate of recycling in East Hampshire had been raised from 16 per cent to 34 per cent within a three year period.

This figure has surpassed the targets that the government set in 2003/04 by 16 per cent, which Mr Reed and his colleges, who are involved in the action plan, are extremely happy about.

Mr Reed believes that EHDC will maintain its position as a leading recycler.

"We will be one of the top five or six authorities for the next couple of years, but after that the other areas will catch up very quickly. A lot of money is being pumped into recycling and authorities around the country will have access to the high standard of expertise and experience that we have had," he said.

"East Hampshire should be congratulated because of this this wonderful figure. If manufacturers used less packaging it would help recycling a little," said Geoffrey Whittle at the meeting.

EHDC is only just below the national average for "satisfaction with refuse collection", the average being 86 per cent and the EHDC are currently at 85 per cent, he added. This is a figure that the Waste to Resource team are quite happy with and feel can be improved with some alterations.

"A big complaint we have from residents is that the Onyx crews are not always consistent with the refuse collection. We have been working closely with our contractors to try and improve the satisfaction rates of the public," Mr Reed said.

The Waste to Resources Action Plan is aiming to set up a community initiative that will encourage greater recycling participation.

It would see an advocate in the community, speaking about recycling issues to neighbours who would receive some sort of incentive such as "freebies" and local press coverage in return.

Training packs would be issued to Onyx crews which would educate them about customer relations and ensuring consistency of approach. Information would be given to communities about recycling and waste minimisation with notices on Onyx vehicles.

The action plan would also look at a pilot scheme which would examine the best way to deal with business waste, although the waste management could not be subsidised by the council.

The website would also be improved to give the public detailed information about how to recycle.

The final object was to develop a promotional gimmick to spread key messages to current and potential recyclers which would tap into popular culture.