Foshan will follow Shanghai’s trial on household garbage sorting

　　Garbage sorting has been a hot topic after the imposition of Shanghai Household Waste Management Regulation, which was known as the strictest waste management rule ever.

　　Garbage sorting is nothing new to the Foshan citizens. In 2017, the 7th Block, Uni Park and other places in Nanhai District have been selected as pilot zones for household garbage classification from the source. Among them, Dali Town has achieved substantive progress in this work. However, sorting effect among different areas varies and the awareness of sorting waste needs to be raised.

　　Status quo: pilot supermarkets have basically achieved classification requirement

　　Since the 7th Block Residential Building was chosen as one of the pilot zones in 2017, over 20 trash cans in the residential neighborhood were filled with about 0.75 tons of garbage from 323 households. According to the promotion director of Guangdong Bluewit Sanitation Service Co Ltd Zhang Shuxian who was responsible for the garbage sorting in this area, the company had posted a series of advertising posters about garbage sorting and offered a number of trash cans to facilitate sorting work after knowing the daily amount and composition of rubbish and the residents’ habits of waste disposal.

　　One of the residents, Mr. Tan approved of this regulation greatly. “In the past, everyone threw their rubbish into one big dustbin. But now with many different ones, we are starting to think twice before putting the waste into certain dustbins.” said Mr. Tan. In his house, there are two kinds of bins, one for the kitchen waste and the other for the general waste. With the release of incentive mechanism from Bluewit, residents can receive points and exchange small gifts when classifying rubbish. The effective pattern has already been found in some residential neighborhoods in Guicheng.

　　Apart from living areas, certain supermarkets also try to sort rubbish, which includes Uni Park. Every shop needs to sign the Garbage Sorting Agreement and organize personnel-training according to director of property management Xu. In his opinion, it will be hard to promote garbage sorting unless every party gets involved.

　　However, compared to pilot residential areas, garbage sorting in other places is not satisfactory. Though there are specific guide for residents, their awareness needs to be improved.

　　Before 2019, Nanhai residents mainly classified their rubbish into three kinds: recyclables, hazardous waste and non-recyclables. Since 2019, Nanhai District added one more kind of rubbish, which is kitchen waste. The new classification pattern has been used in some pilot schools and some government institutions.

　　Classified rubbish will be delivered to different places. “Recyclables can be sorted by city cleaners for sale or sold to recycling companies, and then transported to the renewable resources recycling system. Other waste can be burnt for electricity production. Hazardous waste can be recycled by some companies designated by Environmental and Sanitation Department and then treated in an environmentally-friendly way.

　　Zhang also added that kitchen waste can be used for bio-diesel extraction and marsh gas power generation in which methane liquid can be used for water cultivating nutrient solution and methine scum can be burnt for further electricity production.

　　Prospect: distribution+ classification facilitates domestic waste disposal

　　In order to advance urban-rural domestic waste classification and reduce the amount of rubbish, Foshan has set up pilot zones in Nanhai District to carry out domestic waste classification in 2017; In 2018, Foshan released Suggestion on the Implementation of Advancing Urban-rural Domestic Waste Classification and Reduction of the Amount of Rubbish.

　　（Source:Foshan China）