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Every single Japanese home separates their trash into: (1) burnable trash, (2) plastic, (3) paper-pack, (4) PET bottles, (5) cans, (6) glass bottles, (7) cardbo
by nihonde 11y ago
Every single Japanese home separates their trash into: (1) burnable trash, (2) plastic, (3) paper-pack, (4) PET bottles, (5) cans, (6) glass bottles, (7) cardboard, (8) broken glass, metal, etc., and (9) large items such as furniture.
When I first moved to Japan, I thought it was crazy how many rules there were about separating garbage. It was inconceivable to me that people took the time and effort to ensure that the plastic bits from product packaging go into one bin, and the paper bits into another.
The first time I had to wash a plastic food container and leave it out to dry so that I could throw it away clean, I balked. No one could possibly put up with this nonsense.
Guess what? It's been over a year now since I moved to Japan, and the garbage routine is a completely invisible part of my life. You get into the habit. It feels good to do your part. Everyone else is doing their part, too.
Is Japan the perfect (or even the most effective) country in terms of recycling and waste management? Not at all. Is it by far the cleanest place that I've ever lived in (including USA and Europe)? Absolutely, yes.
I'm not suggesting that Japan has the answer. I'm just observing that a sorting effort made from the bottom up distributes the work and avoids the expense of sorting later. Until I'd seen it in action, I would never have believed that people would tolerate such a confusing and onerous system.
- galfarragem 11y agoRecycling looks as the perfect activity to apply the strategy of gamification. E.g. Each family could have a card and get some score for amount of recycling materials. Then this score could be translated as prizes for children, pets, etc.
- tomjen3 11y agoThat idea is pretty fucking insulting. If my local community came up with that I would trash the notification and card straight away.
- galfarragem 11y agoMaybe you should use your anger as fuel to elaborate a bit more your comment..
- tomjen3 11y agoI don't see how you can't see that as insulting. It is treating you as a child.
- seabee 11y agoMy local council has a reward scheme. Recycling earns points redeemable at participating local shops. I suspect it is ineffective. I've always recycled as much as I can but the incentives are too small for me to bother signing up, let alone encourage someone else to recycle more.
- tomjen3 11y agoThat would definitely piss me of too. Enough so that I wouldn't do it and just throw it in the wrong bin, or just dump it somewhere. If I were to clean it that much, I would expect to be payed the full value of the materials, plus cost of labor and water.
- sinxoveretothex 11y agoSome would consider themselves payed in full in the fact that their environment is clean. Less taxes being used to clean the streets or wherever people's 'dumpsite' is, if you prefer.
- nihonde 11y agoOddly enough, Japanese people do it because it's not that much trouble and the rewards for the overall community are substantial—perhaps even existential—in nature. I agree with you that a selfish, lazy culture where everyone is in it for their own short-term gain will not be able to function in this way. There is indeed a problem with foreign enclaves in some Japanese cities refusing to put in the effort. As far as I know, that is where the municipal authorities come into the picture, levying fines, etc. There is a very strong "can't do" attitude that is pervasive all across America and Europe (with perhaps Scandinavia excepted) and it is quite obvious once you join a group that actually puts in the effort to serve the group's overall interests based on rational thinking.
- barrkel 11y agoI'd much rather pay someone else to sort out garbage. Ideally machines would take over the task and reduce the cost to a minimum.
- nihonde 11y agoIt's safe to say that you missed my point.
- ngrilly 11y agoAfter you've mixed everything together, it's not always possible to sort out things into separate materials. This is the entropy applied to waste management. And it's the reason why it's better to sort out garbage at the source.
- Grishnakh 11y agoThat's because Japanese society is superior that way: people want to work for the good of their society. That approach would never work in America because the American mentality is "fuck you jack, I got mine". So to make recycling work really well here, it has to be invisible: you need to use automation on the whole waste stream to pull out recyclable materials because Americans are just too lazy, entitled, and downright stupid to recycle on their own. Half of them even think that recycling is a bad thing (similar to how many Americans think the Moon landings never happened, and that the Earth is 6000 years old).