Unnecessary and wasteful mooncake packaging [News]

By Ng Puay Leng and Wayne Chan, Channel NewsAsia, 26 Aug 2011.

The Mid-Autumn Festival is just two weeks away, and mooncake retailers islandwide are competing for buyers’ attention with bright, attractive packaging.

But the Singapore Packaging Council said some retailers have gone overboard.

It said 40 per cent of mooncake box packaging is unnecessary and wasteful.

Some mooncake boxes are too thick and others too big. Over-packaging individual mooncakes can also be wasteful.

Packaging is responsible for one-third of Singapore’s domestic waste.

And the Singapore Packaging Council said some countries like China have regulations that the packaging can only cover up to 30 per cent more than the size of the mooncake.

But there are no similar laws here.

Source: Channel NewsAsia

Waste as a Resource: Potentials & Limits [Events]

Date: 31 Aug 2011, 2 – 3.30pm
Speaker: Professor Rainer Stegmann
Register at the SEI website

Source: SEI

Singapore’s Waste Management Industry to Get $5 Million WSQ Training Boost to Raise Productivity Levels [Press Releases]

Singapore, 12 August 2011 – Some 6,000 Singaporean workers in the Waste Management industry are targeted to benefit from a new Singapore Workforce Skills Qualifications (WSQ) programme for the Waste Management industry. These include workers such as Waste Collection Truck Drivers, Fleet and Route Coordinators, Waste Recycling workers, Plant Technicians and Managers.

Mr Lim Swee Say, Secretary-General, National Trades Union Congress, presided at the launch of the programme at Veolia ES Singapore today which was held in conjunction with the graduation of the first batch of workers from the new WSQ programme. This programme was developed by the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) in collaboration with the National Environment Agency (NEA) and the Waste Management and Recycling Association of Singapore (WMRAS) which has a 95-member base comprising all major Singapore waste management companies. Read more

S$5m to boost productivity in waste management industry [News]

By Saifulbahri Ismail, Channel NewsAsia, 12 Aug 2011.

The waste management industry will get a S$5 million boost to raise productivity.

The investments will be used to improve work processes for tasks like trash collection.

For example, a bin equipped with Radio-Frequency (RFID) technology is able to record data such as the household it is from and the weight of recyclables when the bin is hooked to a truck.

Veolia Environmental Services said this has helped improve productivity by 15 per cent.

Some 6,000 workers in the industry are also expected to benefit from a new workforce skills qualification (WSQ) programme. Read more

Plans to make recycling more convenient for HDB residents [Letters]

Letter to The Straits Times, 9 Aug 2011.

We thank Mr N. Nagesh for his feedback (“Chute, don’t let recyclables go to waste”; July 28).

HDB has embarked on initiatives to make recycling more convenient for its residents. This includes conducting pilot projects to use a separate recycling chute at the common area of every floor. The first of such projects was implemented in Choa Chu Kang in December 2006.

HDB has now progressed to the next phase of trials. Separate recycling chutes will be provided along the common areas near the centralised refuse chutes at four new HDB projects – Fernvale Vista in Sengkang, Treelodge@Punggol and two build-to-order projects currently under construction at Dawson.

We will evaluate the results from these projects, including the cost and their maintenance requirement, before considering wider-scale implementation to more projects.

Tan Hock Seng Alan
Deputy Managing Director (Environmental Sustainability Research)
Housing & Development Board

Source: The Straits Times

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