Sunday, March 23, 2008

How about 'zero waste'?

Waste disposal has always been a serious problem of almost every government. Different countries adopt their own different methods to deal with waste disposal. Singapore, for example, is using a combination of methods of land-filling and incineration in dealing with waste disposal. However, there is another new way of waste disposal to us-“zero waste” currently. In my opinion, zero waste is the most suitable way to Singapore to solve disposing problem.
The premise of zero waste is that everything we buy is, or eventually will be, made from materials that can be repaired, reused or recycled. This is essential to Singapore because Singapore has too little resources and lands to use for land-filling. The large population density also implies that we cannot find a suitable place on this tiny island to burn the waste without affecting people’s normal life. If we could build up factories which are pollution-free to resolve the waste and reuse the materials to make new products, that will be ideal to Singapore. On the other hand, this method is somehow a capital intensive work. Fortunately, Singapore is capable to do this as it is a rich and small nation.
Furthermore, Singapore’s economy relies much on tourism industry. The country cannot do things like big ones where government can transfer the waste to rural areas to burn or bury without affecting the city and thus remain its travel destinations clear. However, zero waste is, actually, trying to help the government to achieve this-we can dispose of our waste clearly through zero waste scheme.
Lastly, zero waste is an environment-friendly scheme. In term of environment protection, this scheme has been seen as a possible, sustainable one in future. It is worth us to put money on it and to run it for a long time.
In all, zero waste is much more meaningful to Singapore to adopt in dealing with waste disposal instead of current methods.

3 comments:

Syeda said...

Nice discussion...It seems every nation lacks something one way or the other:(

Yao Chengzhi said...

good essay.do remember come to my blog heihei

Su Mon said...

Nice topic to discuss. Yes , what syeda said is true , it seems every nation have at least one weak point.