Nearly 4m drink containers collected in recycling drive

More Singaporeans have been recycling this past year, and many do not need to be enticed by rewards.

A rewards-based recycling programme saw close to four million beverage containers being collected by its 50 reverse vending machines islandwide since its launch in October last year.

The Recycle N Save initiative, developed by the National Environment Agency (NEA) and F&N Foods, also found that more users opted for the vending machines that dispensed non-monetary rewards, and about one in five of them chose the "no reward" option when dropping empty cans into these machines.

"These findings suggest that there is greater environmental awareness among users and recycling habits are starting to form among members of the community," said NEA and F&N Foods in a joint statement yesterday.

The 50 vending machines comprise two types - a single-reward one that dispenses a 20-cent FairPrice discount coupon after 20 containers have been deposited, and a multi-reward one that offers four types of non-monetary rewards.

For every 10 containers deposited into the multi-reward vending machine, users can choose from four rewards including a 50-cent ActiveSG credit and five Sentosa Fun Pass tokens, or opt for no reward.

The FairPrice vouchers are the most popular, but a sizeable number of users have been choosing the "no reward" option available in the multi-reward vending machines.

The nearly four million containers collected translates to about 200 containers collected from each vending machine every day.

Since the roll-out of all 50 vending machines in June this year, the collection rates for both types of machines have increased steadily each month, with more preferring to use the multi-reward one.

The vending machines are in places such as Our Tampines Hub, Tiong Bahru Market and Yishun Park Hawker Centre.

Under the initiative's school education programme introduced in March, five primary and secondary schools had vending machines that did not dispense any rewards.

Number of drink containers collected since the launch of the Recycle N Save initiative in October last year.

Number of vending machines islandwide.

Despite the closure of schools during the circuit breaker period, more than 20,000 drink containers were collected over the first run of the programme that ended last month.

Those five schools included Elias Park Primary School and Nanyang Girls' High School.

The school education programme's second edition, which will run from Jan 4 to May next year, involves a new batch of five schools including Assumption English School and Dunman High School.