NEWS

2024.02.22

【Report】The 64th AJI Frontier Seminar was held! Ms. Kyungah CHEON, presented “Food Waste Recycling in South Korea: Its Current Status and Challenges”

The 64th AJI Frontier Seminar was held online on Tuesday, February 13. In this seminar, Ms. Kyungah CHEON (Assistant Researcher, Asia-Japan Research Organization, Ritsumeikan University) gave a beneficial presentation titled “Food Waste Recycling in South Korea: Its Current Status and Challenges.”

Mr. Cheon specializes in studying food waste recycling, its resource utilization in South Korea, and its comparison with garbage disposal in urban areas in the United States, France, and Japan. South Korea’s domestic system is considered a successful international model for mandating food waste disposal. In this presentation, she discussed the history, current status, and future challenges of Korea’s efforts to recycle garbage.

Korea had a serious garbage disposal problem around the 1980s. A typical example of the severity of the problem is the trash heap on Nanjido (난지도 蘭芝島). The garbage pile reached nearly 100 meters and was known as the world’s tallest garbage mountain. In addition, the garbage piles harmed the surrounding ecosystem.

How did Korea move toward a recycling-based society? Ms. Cheaon explained the historical background clearly, including the growing momentum of civil movements in Korean society and the increasing opposition from residents to the construction of landfill and incineration facilities, coupled with the dioxin problem at the time.

In the context of this serious social issue, the Korean government has undertaken large-scale renovation and greening of the area around Nanjido. As a result, the area has been transformed into an ecological park. The park has a garbage disposal facility and a power plant powered by heat from garbage decomposition. These efforts have been realized in a policy towards promoting a recycling-oriented society in the Nanjido area as well as the entire Korean society.

In addition, Ms. Cheon presented her detailed research results on how the system of improving the recycling rate throughout South Korea is working through the unification of policies and cooperation among local governments. In particular, the rate of incineration and landfilling significantly decreased, and the recycling rate increased through the introduction of regulations such as the mandatory waste sorting system in 1991, the introduction of a waste consumption system in 1995, and the prohibition of landfilling using food waste in 2005. In parallel with these stricter regulations, the current system for garbage disposal in Korea has been formed. Ms. Cheon introduced intriguing examples, such as the use of dedicated garbage containers linked to users’ purchases of dedicated garbage payment stickers, and the use of the trash boxes of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) installed on the streets. Through these methods, the total amount of garbage discharged from local governments in Korea can be ascertained and efficiently disposed of. Comparatively, in Japan, there is only one example of an experimental introduction of a device similar to RFID in Ichikawa City, Chiba Prefecture, which is not widely recognized.

At the end of the presentation, it was pointed out that the next challenge for garbage disposal in Korea is to reduce the feed conversion rate, compost food waste, and shift it to energy resources. However, in Korea, the main methods of resource utilization are livestock feeding, composting, and biogasification.

During the Q&A, the participants discussed the differences in garbage disposal costs between South Korea and Japan and incentives to raise awareness of the burden on residents. Ms. Cheon answered each question politely and clearly. She also expressed an exciting view that the relatively high cost of garbage disposal in South Korea and the tendency for citizens’ willingness to take the cost has enabled an advanced garbage disposal model in South Korean society today.

Dr. Cheon delivering her presentation

Please visit the following link for previous AJI Frontier Seminars:
https://en.ritsumei.ac.jp/research/aji/young_researcher/seminar/archive/