The Environ0ment Minister Arlene Foster recently visited a supermarket in Enniskillen to look at how the company are cutting down on waste.

The visit, to ASDA, came as it announced plans to plough £10million into lowering prices as a result of reducing packaging on own brand products.

'The store', a spokesman explained, " has taken the industry lead in removing excess packaging and, it has promised to re-invest all of the money saved to go back into customer savings".

In May, ASDA will introduce 'Green Rollbacks' as a follow-on from ASDA's wider commitment to reduce own label packaging by 25% by the end of 2008. Translated, that works out at §27,000 tonnes across 500 product lines.

ASDA Chief Executive Andy Bond said, "ASDA believes that going 'green' should reduce the cost of living not increase it, and so every penny of the £10million saved as a result of this programme will be passed back to our customers," "Our in-house packaging team will review every product, tracking by line the amount and type of packaging used across our own range. Products that have had packaging reduced will be entitled to a Green Rollback, which will lower customers' cost of living."