take all you kit home, don't leave it behind

Festival-goers coming to this year's Glastonbury Festival are being urged to think green before they arrive. "Travel light, don’t bring unnecessary clutter and leave the site as you found it" is the watchword for 2008. The overall message is "Love the farm – leave no trace".

In particular, festival-goers are being encouraged to take their camping equipment, sleeping bags and tents home with them, rather than abandoning them on the site.

However, for any items that are left behind, the Festival has a new partnership which should ensure that good use is made of any camping equipment not taken away.

All abandoned equipment, textiles and Wellington boots will be collected for re-use, some of which will go to the Frip Ethique project in Senegal. Paper, plastic and cans will also be collected for recycling.

Frip Ethique, a unique partnership between ECT Recycling and Oxfam, employs 40 people to sort and bale second-hand clothing for onward sale to local market traders. Run as a social company, the staff are employed under ethical working conditions and paid a decent wage.

Glastonbury mounts a major operation to ensure that as much as possible of the waste generated on site is recycled. 1,200 litter picking volunteers collect and sort waste deposited in 17,000 clearly labelled rubbish and recycling bins.

The new contract with ECT Recycling, a social enterprise, should ensure that most of the items left after the festival will also either be recycled or reused. Over eight tonnes of Wellington boots left behind after last year’s festival have already been shipped to Senegal for reuse.

"ECT Recycling is delighted to have won the recycling and waste management contract for the Glastonbury Festival," said Rudi Van Langenaecker, Glastonbury Contract Manager for ECT Recycling. "We are really going to put the emphasis on recycling and are confident it will help to significantly increase the recycling rate at this year’s festival."

"This arrangement means that the wellies will get recycled properly," said Festival organiser Michael Eavis. "They won’t get shipped out and made into something else. They’ll be used by people in Africa to wear again, which is great."

Glastonbury Festival has introduced a wide range of green initiatives over the years, including a 50% recycling rate, reduced use of private cars, compostable cups and cutlery, anti-pollution measures and this year, the distribution of a million biodegradable tent pegs.

Glastonbury Festival takes place this year over the weekend of Friday 27th to Sunday 29th June at Worthy Farm, Pilton, near Glastonbury, Somerset.

To see all the diverse and excellent acts already confirmed as playing and where they will be at the festival in June take a look at the Glastonbury 2008 line-ups, or all of the stage/area listings available via here.

Tickets for this year are still available and those wishing to attend can register online, click here and then purchase tickets.

Please note that there will be no editing facility for late registrations, so please ensure that all your details are correct, and that your photo is of a suitable size and standard, before submitting your details. Registration, involves filling in a simple form and supplying a passport photograph, and full details can be found at www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk.

The ticket costs £155 for a weekend ticket, plus £5 booking fee per ticket and £4 post and packaging per order. To buy tickets for this year's Glastonbury, you'll need to have pre-registered and have your registration number and postcode to hand, plus the registration number and postcode of anyone else you're buying for. Please not that the deadline for refunds has now passed.

Tickets can be purchased through www.seetickets.com or by phone from 0800 079 2008 for UK buyers and 0044 1159 934 183 for overseas buyers. Overseas ticket purchases can only be made using either Visa or Mastercard credit cards. UK sales will not be accepted on the International Ticket Sales Line, or any other Seetickets telephone lines.

No one other than the above are allowed to sell tickets, and alternative outlets offering them should not be used.

Remember that this year the Festival wants festival-goers to work them to Love the farm, Leave no Trace by travelling light, only bringing what you're willing to carry home. When you buy your tent and camping gear, don't buy the cheapest, get something you'll want to keep. when it's time to go, pack up your stuff and take it away.

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