You work hard to recycle, but where do items go after you toss them in the blue bin?

Gravelbourg's Darla Hobday says the three Rs — reduce, reuse, recycle — have been drilled into her head, but she wonders how many of the items she puts in her blue recycling bin are actually turned into something new.

"Sometimes you put it in the blue bin and then you just forget about it," said Hobday, who asked the CBC podcast Good Question, Saskatchewan to track the journey of her recyclables.

Easier said than done, according to Joanne Fedyk, executive director of the Saskatchewan Waste Reduction Council.

"There's just so many variables," she said.

Recycling companies sell the material they collect to other companies that then use it to create new products. Fedyk said that, like other commodities, you need a buyer willing to pay.

She compared it to tracking wheat. It would be very hard to know if a specific Saskatchewan farmer's grain ends up in your loaf of bread.

LISTEN | Where does my recycling end up? 

14:59Where does my recycling end up?

When you toss something in the blue bin it feels like you’re doing a good thing for the planet. But have you ever wondered how much of it actually gets recycled? We try to track the journey of your recyclables.

The specifics of what goes where also vary by recycling company.

Loraas, which handles Saskatoon's blue bin recycling program, said about 20 per cent of what it collects is not recyclable, either because it's contaminated or just isn't recyclable material. Loraas said everything it does sell for recycling stays in Canada.

Regina-based Crown Shred said 40 to 50 per cent of the items it sells go to the U.S., five per cent stays in Canada and the rest goes overseas. The company said it is confident about 80 per cent of that material does end up getting recycled.

Fedyk said she feels certain that some of the items in our blue bins are completing the cycle by being turned into something new.

"Aluminum cans go back into aluminum cans," said Fedyk. 

Fedyk said the best thing we can do is reduce the amount of items we throw in our blue bins.

Hobday said she is working to shrink the waste she generates by expanding the three Rs into six: reduce, reuse, recycle, repair, repurpose and refill.

WATCH | What can you put in your green bin? It's more than what you might think: 

What can you put in your green bin? It's more than what you might think

8 months ago

Duration 0:39

The Saskatoon green bin program aims to take as much compostable trash out of the garbage as possible. You may have been already composting your fruit and vegetable scraps but this program is going to take so much more.