Seoul paying residents to throw away less food to tackle waste

S. Koreans discard more food waste than global average as processing costs grow

- 

Long treated as a household nuisance, food waste in South Korea has grown into a climate, environmental and economic issue of national scale.

The country generates significantly more food waste per person than the global average, and the cost of collecting and processing it now amounts to tens of trillions of won each year.

In response, Seoul is rolling out a new incentive-based policy to curb what residents throw away in the first place.

On Dec 17, the Seoul Metropolitan Government announced a new “food waste reduction points system”, under which households that cut their food waste output will receive cash-equivalent rewards.

The programme targets households that use food bins with radio-frequency identification, or RFID, which automatically weigh discarded food.

Residents who reduce their food waste by 10 per cent to 30 per cent or more compared with the same period a year earlier will qualify for up to 5,000 points per evaluation period, worth about 5,000 won (S$4.40).