Garbage sorting promoted in foreign resident communities

Shanghai is promoting garbage classification at communities where foreigners reside, such as the Deluxe Family, Gubei International Garden, and Gubei Qiangsheng Garden, which boast residents from the US, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and Spain.

Assuming that foreign residents may have had a lot of experience in garbage sorting and may have difficulties in adopting the local garbage classification method due to the language barrier, the communities have come up with their own system to promote the cause among foreigners.

Michelle, a Filipino who has been living in China for 19 years, was elected as a foreign council member of the Civic Hall in Gubei area for her work in helping 400 Chinese children with congenital heart disease to receive treatment in Shanghai.

At a council member meeting at the end of 2017, Michelle revealed that foreign residents in her community had to abandon the garbage classification habits they had in their home countries due to lack of similar conditions in Shanghai.

"In my home, there are several trash bins for different garbage, such as wet kitchen waste, toilet paper, and batteries and other hazardous garbage, which will only be emptied when collected to a certain amount. I then dump the hazardous garbage into the community's hazardous garbage collection bin," said Michelle.

Jin Weijie, an officer of Ronghua Community on Yili Road S., an affiliate community of Gubei International Garden, said garbage collection at the residents' door is one of the services provided by the community. But since the community committee decided to carry out garbage sorting in September 2017, in line with the city's guideline, the community started to set up garbage classification stations and removed the dust bins from each floor of the community's apartment buildings.

The practice of garbage classification is different in each country, so the community translated the city's garbage classification requirements into English, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese, and posted them in the community.

Most of the foreign residents were cooperative and have adapted to the local garbage classification over time, said Zhu Lihua, manager of Gubei International Garden's property management office.

To keep the environment in the community clean, Gubei International Garden set up  a garbage dumping place and sorting station in the community's underground parking lot; and to tackle the insufficient ventilation problem and make the parking lot odorless, the community assigned cleaners who re-sort and sterilize the garbage.

Also, refrigerators were put in the sorting station to store wet garbage, preventing them from decaying and generating odor during the wait for the garbage-collection truck.

The community's property management office will also post the number of households which didn't classify their garbage properly on the notice board to remind the residents of their responsibility, and the weight of daily wet garbage, dry garbage, and recyclable garbage will also be posted, Jin added.