Japan’s way with rubbish

Press, 14 July 1989, Page 8

Japan’s way with rubbish

From a correspondent in Tokyo for the “Economist”

JAPAN may not be the favourite country of the no-growth Greens, bjit they could learn something fifrom-the way the Japanese deal refuse of civilisation. *• ftfan can ?Md.tatnhot be, burnt Mand sometimes into other, more iateiwies). < *••**&■&«?- - on particular days.- Andl in / r'JTpKyo once" ’a irionth there is a lor sodai gomi, things ; :that are too big for Tokyo’s tiny •> 'T.

The sort of items that are put out for collection could respectably furnish a flat, and do. A prowl around the neighbourhood on the right night reveals rich pickings: tables with the correct number of legs, together with televisions, washing machines and radios, whose only faults are a blown fuse and an out-of-date U look.-. ' J; ’■' <• ' Lack'Of storage space is the main reason that Japanese do ; not hang'on to old treasures. But they also seem to suffer from a . love of the new. Matsushita, the

world’s biggest consumer-elec-tronics company (National, Panasonic and Technics are some of its labels) says the average telly in Japan gets replaced every six or seven years, broken or not. Most of the big junk is delivered direct to the crusher. But eyen the Japanes balk at chucking away cars with some life in them. Instead, they are exported to less fussy countries: 260,000 or so of them last year. ; Copyright — The Economist