Mayor Thomas Menino Monday announced a new recycling initiative in partnership with businesses to increase magazine and catalog recycling in Boston.

The first of its kind in the country, the “Recycling Magazines is Excellent” campaign, or ReMix, will be overseen in collaboration with the National Recycling Coalition, Time Inc., International Paper and FCR Inc.

“As mayor, I made recycling a priority,” Menino said. “This program will educate and remind people to recycle.”

For the National Recycling Coalition, which concentrates on nationwide conservation of resources, Boston is just the beginning.

“Recycling is an easy way to feel like we’re really doing something right,” said Kate Krebs, executive director of the NRC. Krebs said the organization chose Boston to launch the ReMix initiative because of its previous environmental endeavors and successes, which include the collection of more than 30 different materials with its curbside recycling program since 1996.

While all the partners in the ReMix initiative benefit in different ways, the environmental aspect was the key factor in the groups’s decisions to sponsor the program as a way to raise public awareness, officials said. Currently, 75 percent of residential recyclables are paper, according to a ReMix press release. However, only a mere 6 percent of that consists of magazines and catalogs. Program administrators said they hope to increase the number of magazines and catalogs recycled.

The ReMix campaign will rely mainly on magazine advertisements, brochures, public service announcements and refrigerator magnets to spread the word. The ReMix program will report its progress over the summer at the National Recycling Coalition Congress and Exposition in San Francisco.

As part of the agreement, Time Inc. has decided to run ReMix advertisements in magazines such as Time, Sports Illustrated, Newsweek and People, among others.

“The initiative in Boston to increase recycling of magazines reflects our editorial and business values,” said Time magazine President Eileen Naughton.

For International Paper, the largest paper and forest products company in the world, environmental awareness is a major part of doing good business, said David Struhs, the company’s vice-president of environmental affairs.

“The benefits of the new ReMix program are three-fold,” he said. Through the new program, IP will gain fact-based research on magazine recycling, provide consumer education and measure the results of the program.

“Most of all, International Paper would like to get [magazine] recovery rates up,” said company spokeswoman Jennifer Boardman.

A group of Boston special education students who are regulars at City Hall attended the announcement of the new ReMix campaign. The group goes to City Hall on a weekly basis to collect newspapers and other paper waste from the offices and to sort them for recycling.

“Our children will be inheriting the earth in the future,” said Andrea d’Amato, the city’s chief of Environmental Services. “Every little bit we do now makes it better for tomorrow.”