Drop off your pumpkins
Published
Monday 27 October, 2025
Updated
Wednesday 29 October, 2025
Residents can pick, carve and then recycle their pumpkin this Halloween thanks to Swale Borough Council’s pumpkin recycling scheme.
If you can’t fit your chopped pumpkin in your food waste bin, recycling sites will once again be set up across the borough for locals to dispose of their Halloween jack-o-lanterns, and to help reduce the amount of waste being incinerated.
Dedicated pumpkin wheelie bins will be located in Central car park in Faversham, Rose Street car park in Sheerness and Central Avenue car park in Sittingbourne from Tuesday 27 October until Wednesday 5 November.
The pumpkins will be collected by our waste contractor Suez and taken to the Countrystyle composting facility in Ridham to be turned into soil conditioner for local farmers.
Pumpkins can also be cut up and placed inside your food waste caddy, to be collected on your weekly collection day.
Cllr Dolley Wooster, chair of the Environment and Climate Change Committee, said:
“Pumpkin carving is great fun for the whole family and is an important part of many people’s Halloween festivities, but what happens to the pumpkins once we’ve had our fun?
“We want to make sure the borough’s discarded pumpkins can have a second chance at life as soil conditioners, helping farmers grow the food we eat.
“While this may seem obvious to most, please don’t put your pumpkins, or any food, in your recycling - food waste is our worst contaminator and often leads to whole loads of recycling being burnt.
“We know the pumpkins might not all fit in your food waste caddies, so help us keep the borough clean and reuse waste by dropping off your pumpkins into our recycling scheme.”
You can find out more about food waste recycling in Swale on the council’s waste campaign page.
The pumpkin recycling sites will be in:
- Central Car Park, Leslie Smith Dr, Faversham ME13 8PW
- Central Avenue Car Park, Central Ave, Sittingbourne ME10 9GY
- Rose Street Car Park, Rose St, Sheerness ME12 1AJ
The bins are checked every day, but if residents find they are full, please contact the council on 01795 417888 so the bins can be replaced.
