4 days ago
- Business
- New Straits Times
NGO calls for state policy to get people to separate recyclable waste
KOTA KINABALU: A non-governmental organisation has called on the Sabah government to draw up a policy to get people to separate recyclable materials from their waste.
Community Initiative for Recycling, Circular Learning and Education (Ripple Circle) project director Tressie Yap said with the policy in place, it could reduce the cost and burden at local recycling centres.
"Because we don't need to sort out the materials like we are doing now, and the people should be trained to separate their waste before sending them to the centres," said Yap after the launch of the Ripple Circle new recycling centre by Kapayan assemblyman Datuk Jannie Lasimbang at the Luyang multipurpose hall.
She said many recyclable materials were disposed of together with other waste materials.
"We must have a policy to change the ecosystem and people's mindset, so that we can do the work without additional costs of paying the workers to do the cleaning up," she added.
She said Sabah could follow the example of successful countries like Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and Australia, which had a system to segregate recyclable waste, such as a timetable for the collection of papers, plastic and glass.
She said a glass recycling project was started by the group in 2019 with support from corporate funders and the All-Party Parliamentary Group Malaysia-Sustainable Development Goals before it ventured into recycling plastic materials.
"So we cannot continuously appeal for funding. We have to be sustainable and make progress. Because of this, we have to make products to have a circular economy.
"These products are for sale in the souvenir shops in Kota Kinabalu and it can generate between RM2,000 and RM3,000 a month to pay for the workers from the B40 group," said Yap.
She said they have also talked to Kota Kinabalu City Hall to transport glass materials collected at Pusat Lestari of the Kota Kinabalu community hall to the recycling centre.
Ripple Circle chairman Michelle De La Harpe said they would be hiring 15 people from the B40 group next month at the group's recycling centre.
Through previous projects, she said they had diverted more than 41 tonnes of glass and 22 tonnes of plastic away from landfills, besides generating an income of more than RM28,000 for the communities, she said.
Present at the event was Sabah Tourism, Culture and Environment Ministry permanent secretary Datuk Josie Lai.
