Kortrijk (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – Kortrijk launches pilot project to reuse autumn leaves. De Grenshoeve in Bellegem converts them into a natural soil improver to be applied in agricultural fields starting next spring.
As VRT News reported, the city of Kortrijk has started a new pilot project to reuse autumn leaves from public spaces. This fall, about 250 tons of leaves are expected to fall from trees in the city. City services will collect most of the leaves. Residents are asked to clear leaves from their doorsteps to keep sidewalks safe and prevent blocked drains. The city has placed 180 leaf bins in tree-lined public areas.
How is Kortrijk turning Autumn leaves into a natural soil improver?
Officials mentioned that for the 1st time, the collected leaves will be used sustainably. They will not be sent to an external processor. Instead, the leaves will go to De Grenshoeve, an organic farm in Bellegem. At the farm, the leaves will be turned into a natural soil improver for agriculture.
The autumn leaves collected across Kortrijk will go through a natural composting process over the coming months. During this period, the leaves are turned regularly to keep enough oxygen in the piles and prevent overheating or rotting. Over about 6 months, the leaves are transformed into a stable, nutrient-rich soil improver that can be used in agriculture.
“We don’t actually do anything special: nature sheds the leaves, we give them back to nature, and she transforms them into new life. After a year, it has become rich humus. And that forms the basis for next year’s plants,”
explain organic farmers Luc Goemaere and An Van Wimelbeke.
The finished composted soil will be applied in fields for the first time in the spring and summer of next year. The project follows the principles of circular agriculture, where organic waste from the city is returned to farmland.
“What would otherwise be a waste stream becomes a real added value for our farmers in this pilot project. If the evaluation is positive and more farmers show interest, the city will explore next year how we can send even more leaves directly to agriculture.
A specific call to farmers could follow in the spring. This way, we keep the cycle local and simultaneously strengthen soil quality in our own region,”
says Alderman for Agriculture Hannelore Vanhoenacker (CD&V).
In recent years, a number of Belgian cities have launched comparable leaf composting initiatives. Ghent has been picking up leaves from public parks since the early 2010s and making compost or soil improvers for urban gardens and municipal landscaping.
Since 2015, Brussels has also started to collect leaves on a large scale and compost locally, or at local farms, and has fed that material back as natural fertilizers for agricultural use or to community gardens.
In Flanders, many municipalities since 2018 have been experimenting with circular agriculture projects to compost organic waste, such as leaves, grass clippings, and pruning waste, and this material has also been redistributed back to farms and local greenscapes.
