Some thoughts. Taiwan per capita is bad in terms of littering. But taiwan is also great recycling. Im amzed how simple the regulatirs are in their depth of thought.
Plastics can be recycled, thats not the issue. AT ALL! The issue is recyclables need to be SORTED. So there is a multi pronged approach to this. O e is at home/business level. Which means people need to be educated about different plastics etc. Where the government could really help out is instead of knee jerk bag and steaw bans, regulate packaging and labelling.
Take a bottle of coke, or whatever, as an example.
There is the main body of the bottle. Its recycleable, heavy and easy to sort. So not only does it work ok (in todays standards) it is big, easy and fairly clean for grandma to sort and make miney recycling. Aka taiwans good recycle numbers.
Problem: the labels are a different plastic and taiwan is pathetic at recycling âsoft plasticsâ as are most countries. Easy solution is make those types of labels consistent in material base. This is easy as per labelling regulations in taiwan, all things considered, through FDA and labelling laws.
Second, the caps. Actually caps are easy to recycle. But lets face it, when you throw a bottle into recycle because you care about recycling, how often do you screw the lid back on? If not you, most people do. And the lid is normally a different type if plastic than the bottle body.
Hird is the lower âsealâ ring below the cap. It is very easy to point fingers at consumers for being ignorant and/or lazy with the labels and caps as far as not separating them. But that annoying little ring under the cap left of the bottle tey and figure a way for someone without much hand strength/dexterity trying to remove those suckers.
Then think how recycle works on scale. In the millions of tonnes. It must be efficient on scale or it cant happen. Including collecting, compacting then transporting. It needs to be separated in the beginning which is a logistics nightmare!
Best solution, make packaging consistent with recycling to streamline the process. That is just the bare minimum of no phucks given, reducing and changing away from plastics is the obvious route of the future. But packaging laws can make a massive dent almost instantly withiut much worry from politicians about votesâŚeasy as!
Ps. Taiwan already has lots of packaging laws. From a manufacturers perspective this wpuldnt be a big problem. The problems would only arise from taiwan companies tending to be too lazy to try and make money
