A scheme to pay householders to sort their domestic rubbish so that it can be recycled is guaranteed to receive a positive response from the public.
If officials can translate a good idea into a viable system, the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department will be the toast of Hong Kong. If they do not succeed, the real purpose of this initiative will make the department a lot less popular: it plans to make the polluter pay.
And so it should. The SAR faces a landfill crisis as an Everest of waste grows ever larger. If it continues there will soon be no land left to dump it in.
This city is a prime offender in a throwaway world. It is one of the few places left on the globe where there is no charge for landfill dumping. Being prosperous, many residents prefer to buy new items instead of repairing the old. Couples regularly throw out furniture, not because it is worn or broken, but just for a change of decor.
When dumping begins to cost householders $300 a year, people may think twice before discarding items that still have years of useful life left. Better still, if they benefit financially from separating rubbish for recycling, there is a real incentive to co-operate in the scheme.
Other cities have succeeded in making waste pay. There is nothing to stop Hong Kong doing the same. All it needs is a change in public attitude to make people care about the environment for its own sake. But that will not happen overnight. In the meantime, any idea which can coax people into acting responsibly is welcome.
