This image, captured from the Instagram account shows separating waste items for recycling.
SEOUL, March 15 (Korea Bizwire) — With climate change and environment pollution developing into serious social issues, an increasing number of South Koreans are attempting to educate themselves about the proper methods to separate recyclables as a way to minimize the amount of waste destined for landfills or incinerators.
On social media, a ‘praise relay’ is being carried out in which participants encourage each other to properly separate recyclables.
Users share stories and photos of how they have properly separated some items that are difficult to recycle since they are made of various materials.
Also uploaded frequently are posts concerning know-how on the proper way to separate waste items for recycling.
Park Sae-mi, a 33-year-old office worker, recently worked up a sweat after deciding to throw away her old university textbooks. After three hours of effort, she finally succeeded in separating the staples and steel springs from the paper.
“After viewing photos of the huge amount of garbage that had been abandoned by people and ended up in the ocean, piled up like an island, I felt frightened and embarrassed since this will eventually come back to cause problems for us all,” she said.
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, resulting in the rapid expansion of non-face-to-face consumption centered on delivery and parcel services, public attention about separate disposal know-how has increased accordingly.
The number of downloads for the separate disposal guide app developed by the Korea Packaging Recycling Cooperative shot up to 59,000 last year from 13,000 in 2019.
Ashley Song (ashley@koreabizwire.com)
