1{ATION

A Taste of ProgressLegal action encourages the takeaway sector to clean up its act*y"'#**.*Erzg

ou Yanan, a 26-year-old employee ata big public relations firm in Beiiing,is one of the ci!y's surging number of

online food delivery users."Like many of my colleagues, I order al-

most every lunch on food delivery platformsfrom Monday to Friday, and sometimes evenpurchase my dinner online when I workovertime," Hou told Beijing Review.

The online takeaway industry is bur-geoning in China along with the rapiddevelopment of the lnternet economy. Manypeople are happy to enjoy the conveniencebrought by this fresh service.

But environmental activists complainthat the huge volume of plastic utensils,wrapping and cartons poses a great chal-lenge to the environment, and the heavy useof disposable wooden chopsticks is deplet-ing natural resources.

On September 1, the Beijing No.4lntermediate People's Court accepted a law-

suit filed by the Chongqing Green VolunteerLeague, an environmental non-governmentorganization (NGO), against the countrysthree largest food delivery platforms-BaiduWaimai, Ele.me and Meituan.

The NGO alleged that the companies failed

to provide customers with the choice to not re-

ceive disposable plastic utensils along with theirfood deliveries. Meanwhile, throwaway utensilsprovided by the three platforms have createdlarge amounts of rubbish and caused serious

ecological damage.

Rising concernIt is not the first time that people have fo-cused on the explosive growth of plasticwaste accompanying the surge in onlinefood ordering. Recently, a story titled"Takeout Delivery ls Destroying FutureGenerations" went viral on WeChat, themost-used social media app in China. lt alsohighlighted the eco-threat posed by plastic

Aworker atYaofeng Plastic Products Co. in Shanghai

ananges dispovble plastic meal cartons

]2 BEIJII{G REI,IEW NOVEl"lBER 9, 2017

products made for takeout food.Easy access to the lnternet and efficient

delivery are attracting an increasing numberof people to use online food delivery service.

Three out of every 1O people are consum-ing the service in China, ordering about 20million takeouts every day, reported XinhuaNews Agency. ln addition to bnnging conve-nience for customers, the burgeoning fooddelivery sector has created millions of lobs.

On workdays, many people like Hou or-der meals online, especially during scorchinghot or bitter cold weather, to avoid having tovisit crowded restaurants and to save time.

"l am too busy to cooK and I think mostof my colleagues have the same problem.During lunch time, you can see many deliv-erymen in red, blue or yellow jackets, as theywork for different delivery platforms, flocking

to our building and waiting for customers totake their food." Hou said.

A simple dish of noodles, for example,requires at least a bowl, a lid, spoons, dispos-

able chopsticks and some plastics bags. lfthe consumer also orders chili, vinegar or soy

as flavoring then yet more plastic is used topackage these condiments. Thus, it is nothard to imagine how mountains of plastic

waste pile up across the country every day.

ls it possible to replace plastic utensilswith paper containers, which are more envi-

ronmentally friendly? This sounds good butis difficult in reality due to the diversity of theChinese diet. Foods such as porridge, hot pot

and noodles in soup would soak paper con-tainers before they reach consumeTs,

According to media statistics, fromJanuary to May this year, 30.47 mi ion tons

http:i/www. bjreview.com

of plastic products were produced in China,an increase of 3.8 percent year on yearwhich closely correlates with the surge intakeout deliveries.

Who to blameIn the opinion of the Chongqing GreenVolunteer League, food delivery platformssuch as Baidu Waimai, Ele.me and Meituanare the first to receive blame for the prolif_eration of plastic waste because they depriveconsumers of the right to choose whether ornot they want disposable plastic utensils.

In response, both Meituan and EIe.me,which acquired Baidu Waimai in August, havepledged to take measures to reduce plasticwaste.

On August 31, Meituan announced thatit would appoint a chief environment of_ficer to oversee environmental issues fromplastic waste and upgrade its smartphoneapp to provide consumeTs with the option ofordering food without disposable chopsticks,spoons or napkins.

Ele.me followed on September 6 by of-fering a similar choice and putting forward

a plan to introduce suppliers of degradableplastic utensils to restaurants in the longterm.

ln addition, consumers and restaurantsalso play a role in generating the plastic pol-lution. According to Zhou yi, a senior publicrelations officer at Ele.me, few consumersopt to not demand disposable plastic uten_sils when ordering meals online, as manypeople much more prefer the convenienceof throwaway plastic utensils, which can bediscarded immediately after the meal with-out needing to be washed.

Also, restaurants focus most of theirattention on satisfuing consumers with fla-vorsome dishes and ignore their obligationto protect the environment. For example,many restaurants include disposable plasticutensils with food orders even when con-sumers do not want them, as they find ittroublesome to distinguish such orders fromthose that require utensils. Negative reac-tions from consumers such as those whofind there are no chopsticks to eat their take-out food would badly affect a restaurant,sbusiness.

Besides, to keep food warm and prevent

1{ATl0r{

soup from spilling, restaurants sometimeswrap plastic bowls with many layers of cling_film, which also adds to the heavy burden onthe environment.

Worse still, restaurants mostly use non_degradable plastic products due to their lowcost which pose an environmental hazardfor decades or even hundreds ofyears.

Possible way outConcerted efforts by delivery platforms,consumers, restaurants and governmentdepartments are required to address plasticwaste pollution, Hou suggested.

For platforms, promoting environmentalprotection and instilling this idea in consum-ers are a meaningful move. Moreover, in thefuture, they should also make strict rules onthe use of plastic utensils. For example, nomore than one plastic bag should be usedto wrap soup dishes, and all plastic productsshould be degradable. lt is a long and ardu-ous task for them, and the recent reactionsfrom Ele.me and Meituan are just beginnings.

Considering most takeout food pack-aging is dumped in garbage bins and thendisposed along with other household trash,sorting of waste also becomes more impor-tant. Government departments could playa major role in this, and by recycling somematerials, waste pollution could be reducedand resources saved.

Furthermore, there have been growingcalls that the government should also invesimore in developing degradable plastic prod-ucts or environmenta I ly friendly alternatives.

Though consumers enjoy the con-venience yet also suffer exposure to thepollution, many of them have paid littleattention to the plastic waste problem. Forexample, when talking about the possiblemeasures to deal with plastic waste, Housaid, 'As a matter of fact, I barely think aboutthis issue and I believe the governmentshould shoulder the main responsibility.,,

Therefore, environmental groups havecalled for more efforts to raise the publicawareness of environmental protection.They also suggest that consumers changetheir habits a little by using their own utensilsand dishes and refusing unnecessary plasticcontainers. r

CoDyedited by Chris SurteesComments to wenqing(Ebjreviewcom

A deliveryman of an online food ordenng platfonn delivers meal to a customer

http://www,bjreview,comNOVEI'1BER 9,20I7 BEIJIIIG REI,ITW 33