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Give It Don't Bin It scheme raises £1.3m for the British Heart Foundation

26 Jan 2018

The Directorate for the Student Experience along with the British Heart Foundation (BHF) organised a special celebratory event

Give It Don't Bin It campaign

The event helped raise awareness of the scheme and also how the University benefits from British Heart Foundation funding, carrying out research into cardiovascular disease.  

Among those attending were Simon Gillespie, Chief Executive of the British Heart Foundation, Prof Dame Nancy Rothwell, Councillor Nigel Murphy, Executive Lead on Neighbourhoods for Manchester City Council and BHF Professor Bernard Keavney.

The impact of 70,000 students vacating Manchester at end of each academic year is vast and there are many unwanted items that could go to better use. The British Heart Foundation collects many of these items, from clothes, shoes, books pots, pans and crockery to electrical items and furniture. 

The end of term reuse campaign, known as ‘Give It Don’t Bin It’ is aimed at encouraging students to donate instead of leaving unwanted items to go into landfill, which can be costly to remove and environmentally damaging. The campaign now has 6 partners involded.

This is the first university partnership campaign in the UK to collect donations, raising more than £1 million as part of an end of term scheme. The BHF presented a trophy to each of the partners involved to recognise this landmark.  

Over 26,472 bags of unwanted items were donated in 2017, equating to 211.8 tonnes to BHF, resulting in a £74,500 saving from landfill. These donations have helped save 2,155,244kgs of CO2 greenhouse gas emissions and saved the weight of 35 elephants in waste going to landfill. Furthermore they have raised over £376,000 for BHF. Over 2,564 meals were donated to Manchester Central Foodbank from food which would have otherwise been discarded.

GIDBI is the most successful end of term reuse campaign in the UK and has so far received some prestigious awards, including:

  • Best Reuse Project of 2017 (Chartered Institute of Waste Management, Sustainability and Resource Awards)
  • Manchester Evening News, Waste Prevention Project of the Year (2014) 
  • Highly Commended 2016 Award (EAUC Green Gown Awards for Community Innovation)
  • Finalist for the Guardian University Awards in 2015

Pictured: (L-R) Kevin Hughes, Senior Portering Coordinator; Kirsty Hutchison, Volunteering and Community Engagement Consultant; Alexander Clark, Environmental Coordinator; Simon Gillespie, Chief Executive of the British Heart Foundation; Fiona Day, Head of Facilities Management; & Helen McGlashan, Director of Residential & Sport Services.