Due to have been published in May, its contents are eagerly awaited by local authorities throughout the country and by the waste and recycling industry.

It was nearly a year ago that environment minister Caroline Spelman announced that the review would take place, and a call for evidence closed in October last year. Since then, Defra has been developing its response.

A week ago, it was leaked that the review would announce the scrapping of the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme, or LATS, most likely after the next target Landfill Directive target year, 2013.

This scheme, introduced in 2005, allows England's waste disposal authorities to trade an ever-reducing number of permits for sending biodegradable municipal waste to landfill as a way of keeping their costs down.

Some councils have complained that the scheme discourages them from running their own trade waste services because any waste they collect from businesses may count towards their LATS targets. More councils are running, or want to run, such services because they don't have to charge VAT, unlike the private sector, and can secure valuable income this way using this competitive advantage.

In addition, continuing increases in landfill tax are now seen as having a better chance of diverting biodegradable waste from landfill than LATS.

Food waste is also likely to play a big part in the review, with a strong chance that authorities will be given financial help to collect it separately.

This funding would also support them in implementing a government commitment to reintroduce weekly food waste collections.

However, the Local Government Association (LGA) has said that councils should be free to spend such money as they wish, and might choose to use other methods of diverting food waste from landfill, such as prevention, incineration and mechanical biological treatment.

Food and other biodegradable waste accounts for 90% of the direct greenhouse gas emissions from the waste sector, which is another driver for action in this area.

The waste review is also likely to stipulate retention of the system councils use to report their waste management performance, WasteDataFlow. However, to reduce the burden upon councils, data reporting requirements will be simplified.

Also, there will be a renewed emphasis on reducing industrial and commercial inert waste especially from the construction sector.

The industry is now waiting until the June conference of the Chartered Institute of Waste Management, at which it is likely that the review will be launched, since Caroline Spelman will be delivering the keynote speech on the first day.

A key theme of the conference will be how to turn waste into resources whose value can be exploited. Furthermore, local government minister Bob Neill will be speaking about Localism and the Big Society and their relevance to waste policy.