Recently, I moved into an apartment building in Penang. What I observed on the how the waste collection is carried out shows the need for those people high up there in Komtar to come down more often and see what is happening on the ground.

The waste truck crew, whether by instruction or of their own will, pour out the contents of the bins on the road and sort out the rubbish into sacks, presumably for recycling. After that is done, they dutifully clean up the mess, sweeping up the non-recyclable left over stuff into the truck.

They repeat this process from block to block of the apartments taking half-an-hour or more for each block.

When living overseas some years ago, the city council in where I lived provided two bins and a large box for each household. One is for kitchen waste, the other for normal rubbish and the box is for dry recyclable materials, ie. paper, glass and metal cans.

The collection truck comes on different days for each type of waste with the dry recyclable material collected at less frequent intervals.

I wonder that after all the overseas study tours that our public officials have taken, such a simple matter as efficient waste disposal has not yet been learnt.

The action required is simple, but the effect on recycling and improvement to the lives of the work crew, and the public, is huge.