Hong Kong's recycling bins are often too filthy to use and are vastly outnumbered by conventional bins, a green group says.
Friends of the Earth says the poor provision of environmentally friendly bins means many people who want to recycle are instead forced to dump materials into bins that will go straight to landfill sites - at a time when the city is struggling to find a solution to its waste crisis.
The government earlier this month withdrew a request for HK$23 billion in funding for a huge incinerator and more landfill sites after lawmakers opposed the scheme. The city recycles about 52 per cent of its solid waste; way behind many other territories in Asia and the West, and its landfill sites will be full by 2018.
Friends of the Earth surveyed three busy streets, Nathan Road, Hennessy Road and Kwong Fuk Road in Tai Po last year, counting the conventional and recycling bins and observing how they were used.
For example, along the 3.6 kilometres of Nathan Road, a Kowloon street popular with tourists and shoppers, it found just nine sets of recycling bins, compared with 164 conventional rubbish bins.
In Hennessy Road, one of Hong Kong Island's busiest thoroughfares, there were 70 rubbish bins, compared with nine for recycling. And in the New Territories, the one kilometre of Kwong Fuk Road boasted only one recycling bin, against 35 conventional bins.