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  Channel NewsAsia 17 Dec 06
Easier recycling for Holland-Bukit Panjang residents
By Hasnita A Majid

SINGAPORE: Household recycling rate reached 56 percent last year, up from 54 percent the previous year. Still, more efforts are being done to increase that number.

Holland-Bukit Panjang Town, for example, is making it even easier for its residents to recycle. The Town has installed recycling bins under some void decks to help them go green.

Chan Wai Ying, who recycles anything from clothes to cans, often uses her creativity when it comes to re-using old things. For example, she has had old clothes made into blankets and old skirts which she can no longer wear, turned into tube tops.

Holland-Bukit Panjang Town, which consist of Holland-Bukit Timah GRC and Bukit Panjang ward, wants more residents like her. So it has launched a new recycling programme to make recycling bins more accessible to residents.

There is a recycling station for every 15 blocks of flats, and there are 40 such stations throughout the town. It is hoped that by making these stations more accessible, more residents will be encouraged to cultivate the habit of recycling.

Lim Swee Say, MP, Holland-Bukit Timah GRC, says: "The idea is to have these recycling stations at convenient locations so that our residents can, on a daily basis, deposit their recycling materials without having to wait for the once-every-two-weeks kind of cycle."

The target is to install a recycling station for every 10 blocks of flats. Holland-Bukit Panjang Town hopes to target 55,000 households.

Previous recycling efforts have failed because there was either not enough volume of recyclables generated or the effort was too labour-intensive and not economically viable.

Although there is a scheme of collecting recyclables twice a month, residents found it too infrequent.

A 6-month pilot project in Bukit Panjang found that residents are more likely to recycle regularly if there are recycling bins in strategic locations. The Town aims to extend this programme to its private estates, including condominiums, in future.

Singapore aims to achieve an overall recycling rate of 60 percent by the year 2012.

Besides recycling, the Town has also embarked on other "green" projects. For example, a wireless intelligent lighting control and monitoring system has enabled the Town Council to save about 65 percent or about S$4000 when lighting 15 blocks. - CNA/so
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