Tonight is 12th night, so it’s time to take down your decorations and cards. That leaves you with the question of what to do with all those greetings now the festive season is over.

In theory you could drop them into your cardboard recycling bag, but it would be far better to have them recycled by the Woodland Trust. It wants to process 100 million cards by the end of the month and, in the process, raise enough money to plant 24,000 trees.

By gathering in and recycling your cards the Trust earns recycling credits from local authorities who pass on the savings they make in not having to tip your unwanted cardboard into a landfill. It also receives donations from some councils and supporters, and is given a chunk of cash by the scheme’s four commercial partners, WHSmith, Tesco, TK Maxx, Marks and Spencer (each of which takes in your cards and passes them to the Trust) and the Recycle Now campaign.

If you’re wondering why this is such an important issue, bear in mind that paper and card makes up around a fifth of all waste put into domestic dustbins, and that at the end of every Christmas season around a billion Christmas cards end up there.

So don’t throw them away: give them to the Woodland Trust and help turn all that waste cardboard back into trees.

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