Waste management presents one of our greatest environmental challenges to which we must respond in a comprehensive, multi-faceted way. Unlike certain other environmental challenges which have a much more global dimension, we are fortunate in the sense that waste is an area where the scope for progress rests significantly within our own control. This applies to all of us, Government, the wider political system, statutory authorities, providers of waste services and every member of the public. Waste is a collective responsibility and requires collectively-based solutions. There are several key factors in addressing successfully the waste challenges. We need a clear policy approach, to plan in order to provide a basis for turning our policies into reality and to ensure that our approach is backed up by a strong, comprehensive legislative code which will provide the necessary degree of environmental regulation. Finally, we need to ensure that we achieve the required scale of "on the ground" transformation, in other words, we need to focus on implementation. At this stage, we measure up reasonably well under the policy, plans and legislation headings.