Recycling to nowhere

Waste paper crisis

The EPD told China Daily earlier this year it was stepping into the crisis in a bid to give local recyclers a lifeline. The department said it was helping the government's waste paper contractors explore new export markets like Vietnam, Thailand and Taiwan and collate trade regulations for setting up business networks.

An industry source, who preferred to remain anonymous, said Southeast Asian countries are not that attractive to Hong Kong exporters not only because it would cost 20 percent more to ship paper recyclables to those places than to the mainland. Other "concrete risks" they may have to face include that importers may not pick up the tab after shipment, he said.

Benjamin Steuer, assistant professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology's environment and sustainability division, agreed that import curbs in the past few years are mainly responsible for the shrinking recycling rate of scrap paper.

He said the local waste paper recycling rate may have fallen for 2020, but it would still beat pessimists' estimates.

"Because of the social distancing measures, maybe less paper has been collected, and a lot of factories and collection yards had to stop operations," he said.

"But during the pandemic more people have been relying on food delivery and other services delivered to their homes. This means you need more packaging (cardboard) and there would be demand for paper pulp (transformed by paper waste)," Steuer added.

The anonymous industry source, who works for a local paper exporter, said that during the pandemic, the quantity of paper waste he collected was almost halved, as companies consumed less paper due to work-from-home arrangements and print media outlets cut their daily circulation.

Who are the people involved in the entire recycling process? It starts with paper collectors carting their waste to small recyclers usually tucked away in alleys and lanes who would separate them before sending them to bigger recyclers for export.

The stakes may be reduced as exporters find nowhere to ship their paper piles. Industry pundits, nevertheless, are still holding out hope for the business, saying fears of a "paper jam crisis" this year may be far-fetched, and recyclers are still fighting to keep their heads above water although the doors for export remain slim.