On Sun, 11 Oct, LOCCAL held our Annual General Meeting online, where members gathered to reflect on our third year as a registered charity and to elect the committee for the year ahead.

At the AGM we also presented our 2025-26 annual report, which tells the story of a year spent building connections far and wide, across Australia and beyond. Membership grew to 95 members spanning every state and territory, representing community composting in community gardens, schools, apartment blocks, backyards, verges and parks.

Some highlights from the year include:

• 49 posts and videos on our Updates page, and 11 issues of The LOCCAL Loop newsletter
• Two online convergences, the Community Composter’s Spring Convergence in October 2025 and our International Compost Week celebration in May 2026.
• The launch of our What’s On Guide in January 2026, which listed 285 community composting and sustainability events across the country in its first six months
• Publication of a refereed article in New Community journal: A local alliance on a national scale: the story of LOCCAL, written collaboratively by the LOCCAL crew
• New partnerships with Community Gardens Australia, CORE, Peels, The Compostable T-shirt and Compost Culture, and connections with community composters from Taiwan and Argentina
• Ongoing advocacy alongside YIMBY’s Go Slow on FOGO campaign

None of this happens without the care labour of volunteers – including the committee and members, the contributors of material for composting, and everyone who turns food scraps into black gold. Localised, community-led composting is not about ‘waste’, it’s about growing community, from the microscopic to the nationwide levels.

Read the full report here

Welcome to the new committee!

Under our rules, all committee positions come up for election at the AGM. We’re pleased to announce that all our previous committee members were happy to continue, and we are excited to welcome new members to the committee who were also elected to the committee for LOCCAL 2026-27:

General committee: Xuan Wang, Tim Walsh. Kim Frankowiak, Bishwas Thakuri, Michael Mobbs, Dave Goodman, Caz O’Neill and Wendy Bannister

Secretary: Ernie Harbott

Treasurer: Ashley Wearne

President: Clytie Binder

Looking ahead

In 2026-27 we will be developing a strategic plan and internal policies, beginning an impact assessment, and continuing our work across five focus areas: support and capacity building, policy and advocacy, evidence and research, partnerships and sector integration, and organisational sustainability. We’re also looking forward to growing Our Alliance and profiling the community composting initiatives our members run.

If you’d like to be part of what comes next, there are many ways to help: send us a story or an event, join a working group, help with the newsletter, or become a member. If you are not already a member, join us at Membership – LOCCAL