In the wake of Refreshers’ Fair, events at the beginning of term remain key targets for continuing university sustainability practices.
67% of students say they attended their university’s freshers’ fair for the ‘giveaways’ of free items offered by sponsor companies. These ‘giveaways’ tended to consist of pens, Post-It notes, and tote bags.
How much waste is generated by these promotional events, and how can it be reduced?
Promotional leaflets advertised popular Manchester clubs, such as Factory, 42s, and Uncensored Events. Other common culprits included the blue Domino’s paper bag, along with other businesses such as Holland & Barrett, and the University’s own JobClub.
Many students opted to throw away items collected at the freshers’ fair within hours of receiving them. One student said: “The bins were teeming with Domino’s bags. Even if you were given one, they would try to give you another.”
The University’s commitment to sustainability
The University has been highly commended for its initiatives towards achieving sustainability on campus. Manchester is the only university in the world to rank in the top ten for social and environmental impact in every year of the Times Higher Education Impact Rankings. The University was also recently awarded the Green Gown Award for its ‘ambitious’ decarbonisation efforts.
The University has successfully implemented many permanent sustainability initiatives on campus outside of Freshers’ Week. The Bee Cup scheme runs across cafes on campus, focused on reducing single-use cup waste.
The University has also taken steps to sufficiently reduce the amount of paper waste generated by its prospectuses, opting instead for digital versions accessible through QR codes. This is reported to have led to 8,000 fewer prospectuses produced a year, the equivalent to 16 trees.
Another initiative is the Furniture4Reuse scheme which operates from the Simon Building, enabling students and staff to repurpose used furniture, both preventing waste and saving students money compared to buying new furniture.
The University also claims to have eliminated more than 250 000 pieces of avoidable single-use plastics.
Reducing Freshers’ Week waste
The Mancunion spoke with Suzie Hardy, the University’s Environmental Sustainability Manager, regarding the amount of waste generated during Freshers’ and Refreshers’ weeks.
Hardy said: “In the summer of 2024, a working group comprising key departments and staff involved in organising various stalls for Welcome Week was established and discussed the challenges of preserving the essence and appeal of Welcome Week while also exploring ways to make the event more sustainable, particularly regarding giveaways.”
Event giveaway guidelines were created to advise the University and brands against creating and distributing tote bags, unless they had excess stock of these. Hardy said the University had “advised organisers to refrain from procuring or giving away tote bags in the future”.
The Mancunion asked whether the paper used in Welcome Week events could be replaced with biodegradable and seed paper. Hardy said that a “growing number of stallholders” had started to do this but that it would be “unrealistic and impractical to replace all paper with seed paper”.
Hardy explained that the University had dedicated time and resources to ensure that supplier selection and procurement for Welcome Week are “aligned with and support our sustainability strategy and best practices.”
In line with this, the University has reached out to suppliers to encourage them to use a NETpositive tool to capture their carbon footprint.
The Mancunion asked whether sustainability was a consideration when choosing brands for the University to work with. Hardy said: “All participants are familiar with our policies to ensure a safe and sustainable event”.
The Mancunion also asked a spokesperson for the Students’ Union what could be done to reduce freshers’ waste.
The spokesperson said that sustainability was “central to their mission” and listed a number of measures in place towards this. They said that the terms and conditions for brands promoted at the freshers’ fair “explicitly discourage excessive paper use and prohibit single-use plastics such as plastic bags and bottles.”
They also said that “commercial partners are selected based on their alignment with the Students’ Union’s sustainability values”.
The spokesperson said that the Students’ Union had plans for a paperless Welcome Week fair in the future. This contrasts Hardy’s claim that this would be “unrealistic and impractical” to do so.
The spokesperson said that the Welcome Week fair had not yet transitioned to a leaflet-free format. However, they added that they had plans for “stricter enforcements of these policies” for future events.
With such a large student population across the Manchester universities, Freshers’ and Refreshers’ weeks remain elusive targets for eliminating waste production.
