WINNIPEG -- The City of Winnipeg is looking at the possibility of a two-year food waste pilot project.

A report to the city’s standing policy committee on water and waste, riverbank management and the environment is recommending the city spend $1.8 million on the project.

Under the pilot, the city would collect food waste such as fruit, vegetable scraps and meat from approximately 4,000 homes. The chosen homes would be from five different garbage and recycling routes. The broad range of households would have different collection days, both front and back alley trash collection, come from various ages of neighbourhoods, as well as different household incomes and home sizes.

Homes that participate would receive a curbside cart that would be about half the size of a standard garbage or recycling cart, as well as a kitchen container and educational materials, all for free as part of the pilot.

The organic waste would be picked up weekly, on the same day as garbage and recycling. It would be composted at the existing composting facility at the Brady Road Resource Management facility.

If approved, the project would start in October 2020 and run until September 2022. After that, city administrators would then report back to council in 2023 with the results of the pilot, as well as recommendations for a potential city-wide residential organics collection program.

The report will be discussed at the committee meeting on Thursday, Nov. 28.