An agreement to extend the recycling sorting contract held by Southland disAbility Enterprises (SdE) for 12 months has been reached.

The agreement between joint council venture WasteNet and SdE is to be formally endorsed by the three WasteNet partner councils – Gore District Council, Invercargill City Council and Southland District Council – early next week.

Recycling has become highly contentious in the deep south after SdE, a not-for-profit company, publicly disclosed last month that had been told it was no longer the preferred tenderer for recycling services in Southland when its contract with WasteNet expires at the end of this month. 

Doing so broke confidentiality in the ongoing contract negotiation process with WasteNet.

SdE employs 110 people, 82 of whom have a disability.

WasteNet spokesman Gary Tong said the agreement was good news and gave all parties some space while ensuring the workers at SdE could continue to come to work every day.

"I'm just so pleased we can now focus on moving forward."

However, he said he could not comment on the financial details of the contract extension until the agreement was formally endorsed next week.

SdE acting board chairman Stuart Collie said the board was pleased with this result.

“Our team will now be able to focus on moving forward and ensuring our workers have a level of security.”

This contract is for the 12 months ending June 30, 2020.

Discussions on the tender for the new recycling sorting contract continue between the three councils.

Mr Tong said those discussions were still a "very much alive" process and couldn't discuss them at this stage.