A DEAL has been tied up to help reduce the amount of household items in Peeblesshire going to landfill.

Local social enterprise You Can Cook is partnering Eshiels Community Recycling Centre for the pioneering project.

And it is hoped the waste reducing initiative could become a blueprint for other communities.

Under the partnership scheme, household items which are considered in good condition are now diverted away from the landfill skips.

And they are being reused for various projects across Tweeddale.

You Can Cook executive director Bosco Santimano told us: “Project development officer Alex Wilson has been tirelessly working for the last few months with the council to get this off the ground and we at You Can Cook would like to thank her for all her hard work and dedication to reducing our carbon footprint in Tweeddale and in doing so contributing to saving our planet... one recycled tool at a time!”

You Can Cook currently has four growing projects with communities across the region.

But officials became aware that many of the new gardeners had no access to tools and other equipment.

Project officer Alex began working closely with the local authority's waste services department to see if many items which are dumped at Eshiels could be reused in the community.

Bosco added: "The idea came about after Alex observed many items coming to the recycling centre that could have been reused and distributed to the community that did not have access to such items.

"After researching and speaking to local people including users of the recycling centre, Alex found that the reason was inconvenience and difficulty to rehome

unwanted items and most charity shops did not take these items due to health and safety!

"Many in the community were not aware of the service offered by the charity Home Basic’s in Walkerburn, that would collect some items to sell from their warehouse.

"Working with the community over many years now, we are also aware that many people did not use social media to look out for these items."