| All Those Plastic Bags: Votes for the Ecology | ||||||||||||
| By Ye Zi-hao Translated by Tang Yau-yang Photos by Yan Lin-zhao | ||||||||||||
Guided by senior Tzu Chi volunteers, a group of college students learn to care for the environment at the same time they learn to care for patients in their respective medical fields. When they realized how discarded plastic bags were impacting the environment, they took action to help reduce the damage. Bad things, even small ones, add up—just as good actions, however small, add up to a greater good. That is why we must be earnest in avoiding one and keeping at the other.
"This is a PP [polypropylene] bag and this is a PE [polyethylene] bag,” Tzu Chi volunteer Ho Ming-tsun (何明村) explained. “If you tear it, PP plastic results in smooth edges; tearing PE shows serrated edges.” Ho was demonstrating with plastic bags how one could distinguish plastic made of these two types of polymers.
Ho continued his explanation, pointing out the huge premium that careful sorting would command. “Used plastic bags fetch three Taiwanese dollars [ten American cents] a kilogram [2.2 pounds] if not sorted, but if sorted, you can get more. Take PP plastic bags for example; if they’re properly sorted and separated from other types, you can get up to 19 dollars per kilogram. That’s why we so painstakingly sort them out. We want to create value.” Listening attentively were ten students from various medical departments at National Yang-Ming University in Taipei. They were also members of the Tzu Chi Collegiate Association chapter at the university. Ho Ming-tsun is a retiree from a state-owned business. Given their dissimilarity, their lineup may at first seem a peculiar one, but one common thread had brought them together: volunteering for Tzu Chi. On this day, they had gathered at the Xingfu Recycling Station, not far from the Shipai Station of the Taipei Rapid Transit System, to do recycling. The recycling station was near Yang-Ming University and next to Ho’s home.
After learning several tips for sorting, the college students split into two groups. The first group stayed in place with some experienced volunteers to remove foreign objects or undesirable parts from plastic bags. They picked up scissors to cut off price tags, sealing adhesive, and oil-based ink or print. The second group followed Ho to nearby Ziqiang Market. There they picked up plastic bags that some shopkeepers had collected and saved for Ho. Ho introduced the students to a shopkeeper: “These are first- and third-year medical students at Yang-Ming University, giving up their free time to volunteer. That’s good of them, isn’t it?” The group then went straight to the storage room of the shop to fetch the plastic bags that store employees had collected and saved. The students compressed the bags by hand before putting them into large plastic bags for easier handling. Then Ho and the students moved on to a stationery store to do the same, followed by a stop at a ten-dollar store (similar to “dollar stores” in the United States). They had barely finished five stores before they had collected more than they could carry. Their large plastic bags were waist-high and stuffed full. Ho tied them into bundles of two bags each, and hung the bundles on a bicycle they had brought with them. With the bicycle fully loaded, they carefully walked back to the recycling station, where the student groups swapped roles. The group that had stayed at the station went out with Guo Li-yu (郭麗玉), Ho’s wife. They took a different route but did the same work as the first group had done. The group that had returned began preparing plastic bags for recycling. When the shopkeeper at one store learned that Guo was collecting used plastic bags, she said, “You want these? But they’re junk!” Clearly, the shopkeeper didn’t know that plastic bags were recyclable. This episode may help explain why only a miserable seven percent of plastic bags are recycled in Taiwan, which is otherwise among the leading countries when it comes to recycling. Guo picked up those plastic bags that were about to be thrown in the trash, and moved with her troop to the next stop. In about an hour, the group left the market with their hands full of bundles of plastic bags. Convincing the doubters Ho Ming-tsun and Guo Li-yu manage the Xingfu Recycling Station together. Since Ho retired more than two years ago, he has collected recyclables from markets near his home just about every day. Ho has earned for himself a little fame for collecting used plastic bags, shunned by most people. Many shopkeepers and vendors in the area know that he is the go-to guy when it comes to recycling bags. The owner of the dollar store even asked his staff at his stores in Tianmu and Shilin to save their bags and send them to the store in Shipai for Ho to pick up. Ho wasn’t always so interested in recycling plastic bags. Like most people, he didn’t want to bother with them because of the labor-intensive nature of the undertaking. It was his wife who changed his attitude. Ho explained: “I used to believe that, considering the time required and our limited manpower, we ought not to get involved with plastic bags. But my wife thought differently. She believed that it was precisely because people were not recycling them that we Tzu Chi volunteers ought to get involved.” Pointing at two residential buildings in their neighborhood, Guo recalled the time when she first started recycling plastic bags, around 2006. “I used to collect plastic bags in and around those buildings when they were under construction. There were so many! Furniture wrappers, shopping bags for worker’s drinks and food, you name it and they had lots of it—and all of it was ending up in garbage heaps!” From the construction site, she branched out to nearby markets. Gradually, she established herself among local vendors and shopkeepers as a reliable presence who showed up regularly to collect their used bags. Despite her success, her enthusiasm for recycling plastic bags was not well received at home… not at first anyway. Though her husband helped her process the bags, he kept complaining as he went, and often for good reason. People in Taiwan use plastic bags for all sorts of occasions. Vendors use them to package their goods for customers. The bags might contain fried noodles, fried chicken, juice, or even raw meat and fish. When Guo first started her recycling effort, some of the plastic bags that she brought home were very unpleasant to handle. It was no wonder that her husband complained. What was even more frustrating was that sometimes the couple presented plastic bags that they had painstakingly cleaned and prepared for dealers, only to be rejected because the bags were not sorted well enough. Guo sought guidance from experienced volunteers to overcome such difficulties, and to help ensure their plastic bags would be up to snuff for recycling. And she continued to enlist her husband’s help. At the same time, she begged people not to give them bags that were too dirty to be recycled, and to collect and save rainwater to wash bags that were dirty but not greasy. She also taught them to air-dry wet plastic bags before giving them away for recycling.
Compared to other recyclables, such as paper, aluminum cans and plastic bottles, plastic bags were truly cost ineffective. One can imagine the setbacks that the couple must have run into in those early days. But Guo’s unwavering resolve kept her going. She even said that she would still do it if there were no money involved at all. “People asked me if it paid to recycle plastic bags,” Guo said. “I told them, ‘Yes, I get just five Taiwanese dollars for a kilogram of bags [seven American cents per pound], and, no, I can’t imagine how many I must pick up to make a kilogram… but do you know how much pollution this kilogram of bags would have caused if they were burned in an incinerator?’” When she puts it into that perspective, Guo makes a strong case for recycling plastic bags. Guo remembered that a vendor whom she had approached for recyclables had even told her not to bother with recycling. “The world is coming to an end, so what’s the point?” the vendor said. But such mocking didn’t even slow her down. Ho grew more receptive to the work over time, as he worked alongside his wife and got the hang of the tasks. One day he weighed a load of bags that could fill a truck. “Wow, more than 400 kilograms [880 pounds]!” He was impressed by the weight. “So, if the bags are compacted, a truck should hold a thousand kilograms [2,200 pounds].” He saw that there would be much fruit for his labor. The couple’s tireless endeavors in plastic bag recycling finally convinced people that they meant business and that they had specific criteria in their undertaking. Many have been won over and have started giving the couple clean bags. As a result, Ho and Guo now rarely get plastic bags that are stinky or dirty. Even the person who told Guo that the world was coming to an end gives her clean bags and is now a donating member of Tzu Chi. University youths Members of the Tzu Chi Collegiate Association chapter at Yang-Ming University have been good Samaritans. They help out at free clinics held by the Tzu Chi International Medical Association in remote, underserved areas in northern Taipei. They have also adopted recycling as an important focus of their work. In addition to sorting out trash at recycling stations on weekends, they promote reusable eating utensils, waste reduction and recycling at their school. To tackle the most challenging recyclables of all, they have managed to put dedicated collection bins for plastic bags in dormitories. The students made the collection bins from cardboard boxes that fruit vendors had discarded. According to Zheng Yi-xiang (鄭伊翔), a former head of the chapter, they saw a picture of a similarly constructed recycling bin posted on the Facebook page of their counterparts at National Cheng Kung University, and that prompted them to make their own bins. To keep the collection bins from being mistaken for garbage receptacles, they sealed the flaps of the cardboard boxes and left only a slit open for people to push in their plastic bags.
Before the modified receptacles could be put on campus, Zheng and his fellow members had to submit an application to their school for permission. That was the first case of this type there, but school officials were willing to help. The youths got approval, and they put six collection boxes for plastic bags in three dormitory buildings. These receptacles looked a lot like ballot boxes, and the act of depositing bags was kind of like casting a ballot. People willing to bother with the task of depositing their bags in the receptacles were, in essence, casting their votes in favor of environmental protection. After emptying the collection bins, the youths took the plastic bags to Ho and Guo’s recycling station. Sometimes they even went through garbage cans on campus to retrieve bags that had been discarded there. The response to the students’ efforts, however, was not as good as the students had hoped. The accumulation of bags in the bins was slow: It usually took about a month for a bin to fill up. Zheng and Wang Shi-yu (王師瑜), the current head of the Collegiate Association chapter, talked about the problem. They believed that their fellow students would respond more positively if they knew about the initiative, but they needed to find better ways to spread the word. They were glad that at least the bags put in the bins were never soiled. It showed that students at their school had a good recycling sense. It was about noon when the group of students that had gone out with Guo returned to the Xingfu Recycling Station. They had worked hard, and they brought back enough recyclables to keep everyone busy for a whole day. The group that had stayed at the station had been busy too. They sorted out the recyclables and cut foreign objects off plastic bags. Some went to the kitchen in Ho and Guo’s home to help make lunch. At lunchtime, a home-made vegetarian meal covered the dining table in the couple’s kitchen. The students gathered and chatted as they dived into the food. Their conversation topics ranged from schoolwork to their recycling efforts that morning. “There’s so much stuff at just one recycling station. It’s scary to think of how much there must be in all of Taiwan,” one said. “Humans don’t really have to use so many things,” another chimed in. “I feel that the problem lies in the mindset of the consumer, so changes should start from that end,” yet another said. Guo was glad to see these young students participating so enthusiastically in recycling work. She saw hope in them. Ho, likewise, gave the students a thumbs-up for sacrificing their free time to take part in recycling. Before they graduate and start work to lessen the suffering of patients, these would-be doctors, nurses, and medical lab technicians are making efforts to lessen the suffering of the Earth. The infusion of young blood into Tzu Chi’s recycling mission makes senior volunteers like Guo and Ho very happy indeed. |
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