CARING  FOR OUR ENVIROMENT

Waste is everybody’s responsibility. All CSI commercial business units throughout NSW take a proactive approach to caring for the environment. CSI‘s quality management strategies extend through the production and waste management of its business units, with regular reviews conducted to further reduce waste. CSI operations are encouraged to identify, classify, segregate and transport their waste to comply with legislation and perform best practice.

Offenders are required to comply with any reasonable instruction and cooperate with any reasonable policy or procedure relating to the use, handling and storage of waste, including hazardous chemicals at the workplace.

CSI waste management strategies focus on training staff and offenders in its effective and efficient site operations. CSI provides work and training to inmates in a wide variety of commercial and agricultural activities in correctional centres operating afforestation camps, market gardens and nurseries.

Trade waste is managed by:
• ensuring waste from grease traps does not go directly into sewerage
• regular pumping of systems
• conducting regular testing, monitoring and maintenance
• implementing emergency response procedures
• implementing procedures to protect against eco-spills.

Wherever practicable, cardboard and metal scraps are recycled, wood scraps are mulched, plastic containers for chemicals are reused by suppliers, and food wastes from inmates are further reduced by worm farming and composting.

CSI not only upholds its duties as an environmentally responsible corporate citizen, but is also a major contributor to some of the State’s major environment protection projects. Walking along the foreshores on the NSW South Coast and enjoying scenery unspoilt by exotic weeds, or having a picnic on the banks of the Parramatta River in Sydney, is due to the eradication and clean-up work of offenders, as is the replanting of river bank vegetation and native flora supervised by department staff