Members of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation will reinforce their commitment to waste management and sustainability at the union's annual Health and Environmental Sustainability Conference, next month.

The conference will be headlined by The Chaser comedian Craig Reucassel, whose ABC series War and Waste investigates the the causes of household, farming and retail waste in Australia.

Along with learning about strategies to reduce waste and promote sustainability, nurses and midwives from hospitals around Victoria will be able to share their own initiatives with the rest of the group.

ANMF Victorian Branch Assistant Secretary Pip Carew said the branch’s commitment to reducing its own carbon footprint and creating sustainable practices mirrored the nursing professions’ strong social conscience and concern for the environment.

“We provide CPD education courses and events for members which focus on how they can establish sustainability programs in their own healthcare settings as part of our ongoing work to educate and support the profession in its goal of achieving environmentally sustainable practices,” Ms Carew said.

“On behalf of our members, we also successfully advocated and lobbied the state government for the creation of the new Waste Project Role at the Department of Health and Human Services.

“The officer will work with nurse and midwives and other healthcare professionals across the state to support waste segregation practices.”

Ms Carew said she encouraged anyone interested in the cause to join ANMF Victoria Branch’s Green Nurse and Midwives Facebook support group page, to keep up to date with current news and events in a forum designed for education and encouragement in this space.

ANMF recently won a City Switch award for its new headquarters in Melbourne for demonstrating ‘significant environmental performance improvements and energy savings’.

The building has a 5 star Green Star rating for energy efficiency and is expected to achieve a 4.5 star National Australian Built Environment Rating System (NABERS) rating.

Registrations for the conference are open - do so before 31 March to secure the early bird price.

Visit http://bit.ly/hesconference to register.