LET’S BRING BACK BOTTLE DEPOSITS

Filipino inventor William Chua is suggesting that we bring back bottle deposits. He suggested that idea to me after observing that the junk shops are not buying used glass and plastic bottles, and that is why they would eventually end up in dumpsites or landfills, despite many attempts to recycle them. Many years ago, when most bottled drinks were still sold in two-way or returnable bottles, there was no problem recycling these bottles, because the junk shops were buying them, and the junk collector was also able to buy them from the households. In other words, there was a market for recyclables at that time, and the action of recycling was well rewarded. Today, many if not most of liquids are sold in one-way or non-returnable bottles. That caused a problem, because there was no longer a market for these bottles. The problem was made worse when many products in bottles were already imported, and the importers were not interested in getting back their used bottles. In the old days, used bottles could be bought by the piece, because the sizes were standard or uniform. Since that is no longer the case today, I now suggest that these used bottles should now be bought by the kilo, regardless of their size or manufacturer. Some might think that this is an impractical idea, but practical or not, we should now think of new ways to reduce the volume of used containers that we are throwing away as garbage. IKE SENERES/09088877282/01-25-2024