Routes of Reuse of Second-hand Goods in Melbourne Households

While various Australian state governments have set targets for the reduction of waste to landfill, the emphasis to date has been placed mainly on the development of bulk materials recycling industries than on other strategies for waste reduction such as the reuse of second-hand goods. Many second-hand channels are informal and do not involve market transactions, making it difficult to collect information that could identify patterns. In this paper we report on the findings of a survey conducted with 306 Melbourne households about their practices of acquiring and disposing of used household goods. Our survey results confirm the importance of both formal and informal channels for the circulation of second-hand goods among Melbourne households. Socio-demographic characteristics such as household composition, employment status, education level and country of birth, along with infrastructure issues, such as dwelling types and residential tenures, are significant predictors of the use of various second-hand channels. A fuller understanding of the routes of reuse of second-hand goods will require grappling with complex intergenerational and gender effects, and large differences between types of dwellings, systems of infrastructure and living situations among Melbourne householders.