SINGAPORE: Free home recycling boxes can be collected by every household in Singapore from 9am on Sunday (Mar 19), the National Environment Agency (NEA) said on Friday.
Known as Blooboxes, the foldable, washable and reusable boxes can be collected from vending machines at 140 locations, including community clubs, bus interchanges and other common spaces until Apr 30.
The Bloobox initiative was announced in November last year with the aim of encouraging every household in Singapore to set up a home recycling corner, NEA said.
The boxes were initially available to residents in the constituencies of Fengshan, Sembawang West, Tampines North, Yio Chu Kang and Yuhua during the initiative’s pilot phase.
It was designed in collaboration with a team of students from the Singapore Institute of Technology and can hold up to 5kg of paper, plastic, metal or glass recyclables, as well as e-waste.
When a Bloobox is full, the recyclables inside it can either be placed in a blue recycling bin or a recycling chute. E-waste items should be placed in e-waste bins.
NEA encouraged individuals to check the locations of the nearest vending machines and stock levels before heading out to collect the boxes. They can do so on the BlooboxGoWhere website.
Those collecting the boxes at vending machines can do so by scanning their NRIC or FIN cards, or their SingPass digital NRIC. They can also key in their NRIC number or FIN manually.
“The Bloobox initiative forms part of the national Recycle Right campaign, which aims to help households recycle right and reduce the contamination rate in the blue recycling bins,” NEA said in a media release.
“This complements Singapore’s ongoing efforts to make recycling convenient for households and raise awareness among residents on the benefits of recycling.”
NEA’s deputy CEO Ram Bhaskar said that encouraging every household to recycle is vital if Singapore is to meet its recycling targets.
“We must get everyone into the habit of recycling at home if we want to achieve our national target of a 70 per cent overall recycling rate by 2030,” he said.
“We should also recycle right so that we do not contaminate the recyclables and unwittingly undermine our recycling efforts. Each of us has a part to play to reduce waste and, together, we can make a difference.”
