The LOCCAL AGM last month ushered in some fresh faces to the committee and brought back some steadfast familiar ones. It is very encouraging to have more involvement from members. To inspire further engagement, LOCCAL is launching a new monthly online event.

Compost Conversations

LOCCAL is launching Compost Conversations, a monthly online gathering for people who love, practise and care about composting at the local level. Each 45-minute session might feature a guest speaker, a discussion topic, LOCCAL updates, working group projects, a member spotlight, or whatever interests community composters. Open to all LOCCAL members and the general public, free to attend or pay what you can, online.

For our first session, we’re joined by Friends of Chippendale, whose long-standing Sustainable Chippendale Footpath Gardens and compost project has run for 18 years and is now under threat from the City of Sydney’s draft Community Greening Framework, which would exclude composting from verge gardening. Hear the story from the people living it, and find out exactly how to support them before submissions close on 3 November. Find out more about the issue here: Help protect street-side composting in Sydney – LOCCAL

Register for Compost Conversations: Sustainable Chippendale on streetside composting in Sydney Monday 2 November, 8.15-9.00pm AEDT, online. If you care about community composting, this is the conversation to be part of!

Worm Farming Webinar

The recent worm farming webinar — Small Creatures, Big Impact– on worm farming at any scale with Kim Frankowiak from Great Southern Living Soil in Denmark, Western Australia, was a great success.

Kim has 20 years of experience as a professional worm farmer, with a background in microbiology and soil science, and very generously shared his knowledge with the attendees.

Kim’s presentation included a tour of his worm farming practises on his property in WA, including:

• Domestic worm farms
• Fridge-style worm farms
• Row worm farms

He also went into the science of soil health and the importance of building life in soil.

If you’d like to learn more about composting with worms, why not attend an event in your region?

Worm Farming Workshop [Success] WA 8 November @ 11:00 am – 12:30 pm AEDT

National Recycling Week – Composting & Worm Farming Workshop [Freshwater Community Garden] QLD 14 November @ 3:00 pm – 4:00 pm AEDT

Worm Farm Workshop [Roleystone Family Centre] WA 21 November @ 10:30 am – 12:30 pm AEDT

Check out our What’s On Guide for more great events around the nation.

Highlights from the Last Year

On Sunday 11 October at the online LOCCAL AGM, in addition to electing the committee for the year ahead, members gathered to reflect on our third year as a registered charity. As membership approaches 100, we already have members from every state and territory.

We proudly achieved:

• Two online convergences, the Community Composter’s Spring Convergence in October 2025 and our International Compost Week celebration in May 2026.
• 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
• 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
• The selection of a new LOCCAL logo from the entries to our Logo Design Competition.

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