THE Housing Executive has spent more than half a million pounds dealing with illegal dumping on its land in the past two years.
Costs associated with fly-tipping on land owned by the social housing body have reached £532,820 since January 2015.
In April 2015 the Housing Executive said that "time and money which could be spent on improving homes" was instead being directed into clear up operations.
In June last year, household waste, including out of date meat and soiled nappies, was dumped at a loyalist bonfire off Lanark Way in west Belfast.
Although most of the land was privately owned - on which asbestos was found as a result of the fly-tipping - the Housing Executive was forced to take steps to clean up the part of the site in its ownership.
The figure was released by Communities Minister Paul Givan in response to a written Assembly question from DUP North Down MLA Alex Easton.
In November, The Irish News reported that almost 100 cases linked to illegal dumping are being referred for prosecution every year - although just one in four have resulted in convictions.
Under a fly-tipping partnership between councils and the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) implemented in 2012, the NIEA is responsible for the clean-up of all larger volumes of waste.
Speaking at the time on the low number of prosecutions for fly-tipping, environment minister Michelle McIlveen said: "It is extremely difficult for the NIEA to find any evidence as to the perpetrators of fly-tipping crime, due to its clandestine nature of often being carried out in the cover of darkness and in remote locations."
