This is the hope of the Environmental Education for Resource Sustainability Trust, which has spent the past week visiting Dunedin South and City schools and pre-schools offering its Paper 4 Trees programme.
Trust chairman Bruce Trask, of Tauranga, said as a result of his visits, there were now at least 27 more schools in Dunedin recycling paper and cardboard.
The programme provided green bins for schools to use for recycling. Once a school had recycled 2cu m, it qualified for a tree, flax or grass to plant.
Laminated sheets were also provided so schools could keep track of how much they recycled from the bins.
"It gives the schools a simple method of setting up recycling. The 30-litre hobby boxes are easily carried and open enough so kids can see what is in them."
Audits had shown up to 70% of a school's waste was paper and cardboard, so by recycling it saved on waste bills as well as helping the environment, he said. So far, schools in the programme nationwide had planted 18,500 trees.
He hoped "looking for the green bin" was a habit the children would develop at a young age and carry through their school life.
"The incentive is free trees and the kids will take the message home to their parents."
St Joseph's Cathedral School environment resource teacher Mary Fahey said the programme would teach children about sustainability, the importance of not littering and give them a way to help the environment.
The programme was funded by the Government's sustainable management fund and was in most New Zealand schools.
Mr Trask will return to offer the programme to more Dunedin schools as well as those in Gore, Invercargill and Southland District.
