OBSERVANT RESIDENT of Van Riebeeck Park writes:
For some years now, residents have been urged to help recycle and several do just that, be it paper and cardboard, tins, glass bottles, plastic bottles, and so on.
We all know that most areas have informal litter pickers going around, sorting through your refuse.
In fact, the suggestion was made that households should separate such “recyclables” to make informal pickers’ lives easier and cleaner, and try to eliminate or at least reduce the number of scatterings they leave behind once they’ve rooted through your household rubbish.
Many residents do that, placing such items either in see-through bags or in cardboard boxes.
However, have you noticed that these pickers are getting more and more choosy?
I recently put out a box of plastic bottles and soft-drink tins, along with plastic bags and other plastic items and watched a picker take some items and leave others. I asked him why he had not taken, for example, the plastic bags that loaves of bread come in.
His answer was simple and straightforward: “They don’t weigh as much and we get paid on weight, so I don’t take things that won’t get me money.” Really?
Yes, they might get paid by weight but don’t they realise that everything eventually adds up weight-wise? Maybe we just have “choosy” or “picky” pickers in my suburb.
