How did Rig Recycle start?

When the “Look After your Tackle” campaign was launched to reduce recreational fishing litter in 2020 as part of the ReefClean program,  we also identified that there was no recycling program available for recreational fishing items and their single-use packaging.

It seemed like a natural progression for the Tangaroa Blue team to work on finding a solution that would divert recreational fishing items either collected from clean-up events, or that fishers were looking to dispose of, from ending up in landfill.

So the Rig Recycle program was developed!

Starting as a trial using data submitted from clean-ups into the Australian Marine Debris Initiative Database, as well as feedback from recreational fishers and retailers, the need for the Rig Recycle collection and recycling system, that was able to accept not just marine debris items and broken and unwanted fishing gear, but also single-use packaging items from within the recreational fishing industry like fishing line spools and hard plastic tackle packaging, was identified.

The Rig Recycle program, in its collection infancy, hads 5 major goals which seek to ensure best practice across the entire supply chain and design processes:

• Recover – of fishing litter reducing environmental harm through the Look After Your Tackle campaign.
• Reuse – the reuse of recovered and unwanted items for a second use.
• Repair – through a network of recreational fishing organisations, items were it can be repaired, giving them a second life with social fishing charities.
• Recycle – all hard plastic recovered in the collection will be diverted to a circular recycling framework, providing recycled feedstock for new products, which themselves are recyclable through the Rig Recycle program.
• Reduce – by providing  data from the collection program the types of material used in recreational fishing industry equipment and packaging can form staged goals for increasing their recycling feedstock content, designing better packaging solutions, replacing virgin materials and investing in local manufacturing solutions.

ReefClean is funded by the Australian Government’s Reef Trust and delivered by Tangaroa Blue Foundation.

The Victoria Rig Recycle project is supported by the Victorian Government’s Circular Economy Communities Fund.

The NSW Rig Recycle project is supported by the NSW Recreational Fishing Trusts and delivered by Tangaroa Blue Foundation.

For more information about the Rig Recycle program, please email info@tangaroablue.org