Compliments for USC’s recycling initiative
Thu 05 November 2009
Chong Wei-Shan, Joelle, Bachelor of Communication
Students and the general public praised the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC) for its initiative to recycle materials on campus.
Yellow and red recycling bins were placed strategically outside of lecture theatres and cafés to ensure maximum usage by students and staff. Yellow bins were for bottles and cans while the red ones were for general waste. There were 10 such recycling stations altogether.
Through this initiative, the University hoped to become a leader in recycling practices and aimed to encourage other academic and commercial institutions to follow suit. To further encourage the usage of these bins, an email was issued to all students and staff of the school.
USC student, Paulette Hallinan was “big on recycling”. Her recycling practices at home began after an excursion to a recycling plant with her primary school. Miss Hallinan had used the bins around school and knew exactly what should be recycled.
“I think it’s a really good thing. I’m very pleased with the school. I had been thinking of doing something like this myself,” she said.
“So I’m really glad someone had taken the initiative to do it first.”
On the other hand, USC German exchange student, Miss Julia Jochum, felt that although the school’s initiative was a good starting point, recycling efforts on the Coast were still insufficient.
In her observations, recycling was not compulsory because there were no recycling stations in the areas around Sippy Downs. Miss Jochum believed recycling required collective effort from the government as well.
“In Germany, we have really strict recycling. There is a ‘recycling police’. They go through the streets in the cities and look at the bins to make sure people recycle like they are meant to do it,” she said. “If they don’t, they are charged for that.”
In response to the University’s initiative, the Sunshine Coast Environmental Council (SCEC) campaign officer, Miss Annie Nolan thought “it was a really good idea”.
“There is a need for behaviour change program. The University can include information on how to recycle, what should be put into the bins and why people should be recycling,” she suggested.
Miss Nolan also encouraged the University to monitor the usage of the recycling bins on a regular basis. This will help to determine if people are using the bins.
“The University needs to know the baseline before the bins are placed and after the bins are placed. If people are not using these bins, then the University can come up with measures to counter the problem,” she added.
Miss Jochum felt that the contributing factor to the lack of recycling on the Coast was most people do not know how to recycle in the correct way due to a lack in recycling experiences. Like Miss Nolan, she believed recycling on the Coast would only improve through informing and communicating with the general public.
All three women, however, agreed that the University’s initiative was definitely a good start to creating awareness with regards to recycling on the Coast.
“You start in a school or at work, so people are made aware. When they go home, they will be thinking, ‘why am I separating my trash at school or at work, when I dump everything in one bin at home?’,” Miss Nolan commented, “So it’s like reinforcing the idea of recycling.”
Miss Jochum further suggested that supermarkets on the Coast could encourage recycling by charging bottled drinks at an extra five to 10 cents. Consumers would not only be charged for the contents, but also for the bottles. Bottles brought back to these supermarkets would then be refunded.
“How much does a person drink in his whole life? It is just unbelievable!” she exclaimed.
Through this initiative by the University, Miss Nolan foresaw people living on the Coast cultivating recycling as a habit in the long run.
She reminded that the Sunshine Coast Regional Council (SCRC) is currently promoting a Waste Reduction Strategy, which informed the public to start thinking of waste as a form of resources.
Through this Waste Reduction Strategy, the SCRC hopes to establish Sunshine Coast as Australia’s most sustainable region. Landfills on the Coast are expected to be filled thoroughly by 2014. The SCRC intends to reduce the Coast’s waste into landfill to zero by 2020.
Waste disposal and collection of recyclable materials are handled by waste management facilities run by the SCRC. Recyclable materials include paper, cardboard, aluminium, plastic, steel and glass while organic materials could be composted through worm farming.
Image(s) designed by Chong Wei-Shan, Joelle