Mango Glut in Brisbane, Australia Causes Garbage Collection Chaos

Brisbane, Australia is a lovely city with plenty of trees gracing the landscape. A lot of backyards in older residential areas have a large mango tree that has been growing there for many years. Unfortunately, there has been a post-drought mango boom and residents are not able to cope with disposing of unwanted mangoes.

Households in Brisbane and surrounding council shires are provided with two wheelie bins, one for general household waste and the other for recycling items. Household waste bins have a weight limit of 70 kilograms (154.32 pounds) and should contain only household rubbish. Normally, most households would not have more than this weight for the weekly bin emptying service. But lately, some mango tree owners have reported 60 or more ripe mangoes per night dropping to the ground. With each mango weighing approximately 700 grams (1.5432 pounds or 24.692 ounces), they are faced with a struggle to dispose of the quickly rotting fruit that they are unable to consume. Typically mango trees produce between 20 and 25 kilograms of fruit, but in a bumper season, each tree can yield up to 120 kilograms of the popular fruit.

Brisbane City Council garbage collectors are now refusing to pick up bins that are overweight, some being 100 kilograms (220.46 pounds) in excess of the limit. Even a bin half full of mangoes is too heavy for the truck arm to lift. Those faced with this mango disposal problem were being urged by Councils to use their waste vouchers (issued with quarterly rates notices) to dispose of the fruit at the tip. Residents were also being encouraged to hire a skip, if necessary, to dispose of their pickings. This suggestion was not acceptable to some residents with neither the facilities nor the means to take up this option (eg. an elderly resident with no vehicle or spare cash to pay for expensive skip hire).

So bad is the problem that Council has now responded to the city's mango glut by unleashing "flying squads" to collect tonnes of the fruit rotting in suburban backyards. Householders can now bag the fruit, phone a hotline and leave the fruit on the footpath for collection within 48 hours.

Councillor David McLachlan, Chairman of the City Businesses and Local Assets Committee, also encouraged residents to consider taking advantage of the mango yield by more old fashioned means.

"Perhaps people can make mango chutney or cube the mangoes and freeze them for use in the winter," Cr McLachlan said today. "In fact a tried and tested mango chutney recipe from up Mackay way will be posed on the council website today. But for those people who have more than they can reasonably use we will send out our flying squad."

The offending mangoes are not a designer variety

Queensland in Australia is renowned for its delicious tropical fruits, mangoes being just one of many types. Consumers are very fond of Bowen Mangoes (grown mainly in the Bowen area of North Queensland), but there are many other varieties available.

The common Backyard Mango variety (Magnifera Indica) has been placed on the inaugural list of twelve indispensable elements of Queensland culture by the National Trust as a Queensland Icon, along with Southern Cross Windmills, Bundaberg Rum and the Flying Doctor Service. These are the mangoes referred to in this article. They have a beautiful flavor but can be "stringy" if picked too green. They and are not generally available for sale in fruit shops because the market has moved to distributing "designer mangoes". Kensington Pride is one variety sold everywhere in supermarkets and even by roadside vendors. However, people with backyard mango trees consume the fruit with gusto. But how many mangoes is too many mangoes to cope with?

I hope some residents are taking some of their excess mangoes to charities that feed the homeless and depots that give free food to those experiencing tough times. I am sure these people would love to share in this bumper fruit crop.

Sources:

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/council-in-wheelie-bin-spin-over-mango-glut-20100112-m34b.html

http://www.daleysfruit.com.au/fruit%20pages/mango.htm

http://www.mangoes.net.au/homegrown/origins.aspx

http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/stories/s2164092.htm

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