our commitment to sustainability

At the Wānaka Festival of Colour, we are dedicated to reducing our environmental impact and working towards a zero-waste event. Through our partnership with Wastebusters, we ensure that waste is minimised, resources are reused, and recycling is maximised across all festival venues.

We  encourage our performers to embrace sustainable practices as part of their time at the festival. This includes reducing travel emissions, minimising waste, and considering eco-friendly production elements.

One of our featured performers, Trick of the Light Theatre, has written a Green Theatre Guide to help others in the arts sector reduce their environmental footprint. Many of them are now auditing their impact. You can explore a great toolkit with practical tips and strategies at Green Theatre NZ.

Our Key Waste Minimisation Initiatives:
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‍✅ SUC Free Wānaka – We proudly support the Single-Use Cup Free Wānaka initiative. Please bring your own reusable cup to help us reduce waste.
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✅ Reusable Serveware – Our festival café and bar and community day vendors will use only reusable crockery and glassware, reducing single-use waste.
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✅ Comprehensive Recycling & Composting – Waste stations are set up at The Crystal Palace and Lake Wānaka Centre to separate glass, paper, cans, cardboard, and food scraps, ensuring they are properly processed. Waste is collected from all venues and responsibly sorted. Our caterers, Federal Diner, feed food waste to their pigs and create compost for their gardens.
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✅ Waste Audits & Reduction Targets – Where possible, we conduct waste audits to track our impact and aim to reduce single-use coffee cups brought in by our audience by 50% at the 2026 festival. We hope to have audit measures in place for 2025.
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✅Digital Programmes – We are minimising printed materials and encouraging festival-goers to use our digital programme to reduce paper waste.
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✅ Eco-Friendly Signage & Merch – Our signage is designed for reuse, and we encourage vendors to use minimal packaging and sustainable materials.
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✅ Waste-Free Event Operations– Our backstage waste hub, volunteer waste sorters, festival staff and dedicated waste management team help us divert waste from landfill.

✅ Carbon Footprint Awareness – We acknowledge that flying and driving our artists, speakers and crew has an impact. As part of our ongoing sustainability efforts, we plan to audit our greenhouse gas emissions to identify areas where we can reduce our carbon footprint and improve efficiencies in future festivals.

✅Love Wānaka - Where possible, our Festival Team engages in local community educational workshops, tree plantings and initiatives to learn how we can reduce our impact. The photos adjacent are from a industry tree planting day with Te Kakano in 2023. Photo credits: Jordan Siobhan @Valley Content.

‍How You Can Help:
🌏Bring your own reusable cup and water bottle
🌏Carpool, bike, or use public transport
🌏Follow waste station signage at the festival.
🌏Use your eTickets to scan in rather than printing tickets.
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Let's create a sustainable, waste-conscious festival that respects our beautiful wahi - place. Thank you for doing your part!