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Recycling in Malaysia

 
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My recycling monograph in 18 installments

01 Preface
02 Pee
03 Humanure
04 Toilet Paper
05 non-toilet-paper tissues
06 Glass
07 Metal cans
08 the-elephant-in-the-room-plastics
09 Corrugated boxes
10 the-other-elephant-in-the-room-excess-food
11 batteries
12 Used engine oil
13 fruit rind, egg shells and seashells
14 dead pets and roadkill
15 Covid face masks
16 reader suggestions
17 miscellaneous
18 Resources


01 Preface

I live in a landed property with a septic tank system.

This affords me the blessing of multiple compost piles
and greywater systems without a lot of hassle{yes there
are a few instances} from the authorities or the local
residents association.

The advice I give here may not apply to your
locale/circumstances.

A law was passed in my country a few years back which
mandated compulsory waste separation at source or else
face the penalty of fines/imprisonment/both.

It is an unjust law because it takes the livelihood
away from rag-pickers and criminalize them to boot
...
because any trash once placed on the ground or bin
BECOMES THE PROPERTY of this semi-government-privatised
company who have their own uniformed "police"-type
enforcement inspectors. So one way to seek revenge
against your neighbour is to go mess up their pile/bin.
It is thus a stupid law. Imagine having to install a
trashcam to protect yourself. Luckily for me, as you
will discover later, I produce so little trash that my
bin is in my garden supporting a transplanted Moringa
sapling as it takes root.

They have this sales pitch: For the sake of our
children. In reality they just want to grow rich from
easy pickings of nice clean newspaper, clean tin cans
and bottles, aluminum cans which they can immediately
sell to recycling centres and in the future detach from
the ministry under which they are currently parked.

They did not forsee that enterprising parties would
make the rounds early before collection day and harvest
the pickings. I think their own contractors take their
cut on the way to the collection centre.

Schadenfreude.

We need to invest time and effort and water to clean
stuff and don't get paid/compensated in any way. Not
even a discount/rebate on assessment fees.

One legal way to thwart them is to take your own
recyclables to sell to the recycling centre but I guess
many people are just not bothered.

There are 3 collection days announced for my locality.
Two days are for kitchen waste/diapers/contaminated
food containers. These go into the bin. The remaining
day is for sorted and clean paper/cardboard, tins,
plastic bottles/containers, electric appliances,
construction waste, garden refuse, old furniture,
paint, poisons/pesticides/insecticides and batteries
and these are to be placed on the ground beside the bin.
We have a one bin system. Needless to say, these are to
be bagged{which recycling centre would pay for soggy
newspapers?} to the extent that they can be.

No, plastic bags are not supplied so use those from
your supermarket except that some other law following
this tasks the supermarkets from supplying these for
free and now are no longer supplied at some chains.
Needless to say, nothing much has improved and plastic
bags and plastic straws and plastic food containers
still abound. Covid has even given this a boost.

I am not sure about engine oil but one surprising thing
they will not collect is cooking oil. I guess that if
this spills during transport it will damage the clean
stuff. The collection truck initially had compartments
but now everything is just lumped together. After all
they announced at the beginning that microsorting will
be done at the collection centres. They had grand
plans, they did.

The moral of the story: They had it coming. It is a
complete mess with yet another pair of laws and more
detect/prosecute/punish perils.

I think the lawmakers were lazy and simply
cut-and-paste from other legislature and didn't
read/debate before voting.

Want to laugh-then-weep?

Here is an excerpt:

  LAWS OF MALAYSIA
  Act 672
  SOLID WASTE AND PUBLIC CLEANSING MANAGEMENT ACT 2007
  ...
  Access to computerised data

  83. (1) An authorized officer conducting a search
          under this Act shall be given access to
          computerized data whether stored in a
          computer or otherwise.
      (2) For the purposes of this section, the
          authorized officer shall be provided with
          the necessary password, encryption code,
          decryption code, software or hardware and
          any other means required for his access to
          enable comprehension of computerized data.

  Power to stop, search and seize vehicle

  84. (1) If an authorized officer has reasonable
          cause to suspect that any vehicle is
          carrying any thing in respect of which an
          offence under this Act or any regulations
          made under this Act is being or has been
          committed, he may stop and examine the
          vehicle and may, if on examination he has
          reasonable cause to believe that such
          vehicle is or has been used for the
          commission of such offence, seize the
          vehicle and any thing found in the vehicle
          that is reasonably believed to furnish
          evidence of the commission of the offence.
      (2) The person in control or in charge of the
          vehicle shall, if required to do so by the
          authorized officer
          (a) stop the vehicle and allow the
              authorized officer to examine it; and
          (b) open all parts of the vehicle for
              examination and take all measures
              necessary to enable or facilitate the
              carrying out of such examination as the
              authorized officer considers necessary.
      (3) Any person who contravenes subsection (2)
          commits an offence and shall, on conviction,
          be liable to a fine not exceeding ten
          thousand ringgit or to imprisonment for a
          term not exceeding six months or to both and
          in the case of a continuing offence be
          liable to a fine not exceeding one thousand
          ringgit for every day or a part of a day
          during which the offence continues after
          conviction.

  Power of investigation

  80. (1) An authorized officer shall have the power
          to investigate the commission of any offence
          under this Act.
      (2) Every person required by an authorized
          officer to give information or produce any
          document or other article relating to the
          commission of any offence which is in his
          power to give shall be legally bound to give
          the information or produce the document or
          other article.

  Search and seizure with warrant

  81. (1) If it appears to a Magistrate, upon written
          information on oath and after such inquiry
          as he considers necessary, that there is a
          reasonable cause to believe that any
          premises have been used or are about to be
          used for, or there is in or on any premises,
          evidence necessary to establish, the
          commission of an offence under this Act, the
          Magistrate may issue a warrant authorizing
          an authorized officer to whom it is
          directed, at any reasonable time by day or
          night and with or without assistance
          (a) to enter any premises and there search
              for, seize and detain any property,
              equipment, machinery, book, record,
              document, container, receptacle or other
              article;
          (b) to inspect, make copies of, or take
              extracts from, any book, record,
              document or other article so seized and
              detained;
          (c) to take possession of, and remove from
              the premises, any property, equipment,
              machinery, book, record, document,
              container, receptacle or other article
              so seized and detain it for such period
              as may be necessary;
          (d) to search any person who is in, or on,
              such premises, and for the purpose of
              the search, detain the person and remove
              him to such place as may be necessary to
              facilitate the search, and seize and
              detain any property or document found on
              the person; or
          (e) to break open, examine, and search any
              container, receptacle or other article.
      (2) An authorized officer acting under
          subsection (1) may, if it is necessary to do
          so
          (a) break open any outer or inner door of
              any premises and enter the premises;
          (b) forcibly enter any premises and every
              part thereof;
          (c) remove by force any obstruction to the
              entry, search, seizure, detention or
              removal that he is empowered to effect;
              or
          (d) detain any person found on any premises
              searched under subsection (1) until the
              search is completed.
      (3) If, by reason of its nature, size or amount,
          it is not practicable to remove any
          property, equipment, machinery, book,
          record, document, container, receptacle or
          other article seized under this section, the
          authorized officer making the seizure shall,
          by any means, seal such property, equipment,
          machinery, book, record, document,
          container, receptacle or other article.
      (4) Any person who, without lawful authority,
          breaks, tampers with or damages the seal
          referred to in subsection (3) or removes the
          property, equipment, machinery, book,
          record, document, container, receptacle or
          other article under seal or attempts to do
          so commits an offence and shall, on
          conviction, be liable to a fine not
          exceeding ten thousand ringgit or to
          imprisonment for a term not exceeding six
          months or to both and in the case of a
          continuing offence be liable to a fine not
          exceeding one thousand ringgit for every day
          or a part of a day during which the offence
          continues after conviction.

  Search and seizure without warrant

  82. If an authorized officer is satisfied upon
      information received that he has reasonable
      cause to believe that by reason of delay in
      obtaining a search warrant under section 81 the
      investigation would be adversely affected or
      evidence of the commission of an offence is
      likely to be tampered with, removed, damaged or
      destroyed, the officer may enter the premises
      and exercise in, upon and in respect of the
      premises all the powers referred to in section
      81 in as full and ample a manner as if he were
      authorized to do so by a warrant issued under
      that section.

I can understand this if it involves narcotics but it
seems a bit over the top for garbage{but not for a
sit-com if the King and palace become embroiled with an
Inspector Clouseau type officer}.
 
steward and tree herder
Posts: 9895
Location: Isle of Skye, Scotland. Nearly 70 inches rain a year
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I found this very interesting. We hear about the problems that is caused by 'dumping' recylable waste on other countries (Reuters report), but I guess these local laws are designed to help the government to extract what revenue they can from this waste stream.
 
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