An initiative to encourage people to recycle more through the deployment of reverse vending machines (RVMs) seems to have been a success, according to the National Environment Agency and F&N Foods.

Nearly four million beverage receptacles were collected a year after the Recycle N Save initiative was launched in Oct. 2019.

50 RVMs were deployed islandwide. With nearly four million plastic bottles and aluminium drink cans collected, this amounts to roughly 200 containers collected a day by each RVM.

This is four times higher than the 2018 trial of the RVMs by F&N — 55,000 containers were collected by three RVMs in a year.

Increase in collection rate

There are currently two types of RVMs — Single-Reward RVMs and Multi-Reward RVMs.

The former rewards users with a S$0.20 FairPrice discount coupon for every 20 drink containers recycled.

For every 10 drink containers recycled, the latter rewards users with:

• STAR$, which can be redeemed for eCapitaVouchers and eDeals on the CapitaStar App which can be used for shopping and dining across CapitaLand malls, as well as eCapitaMall and Capita3Eats,
• ActiveSG credits which can be used at all ActiveSG facilities,
• Sentosa Fun Pass Tokens which can be exchanged for attraction passes, souvenirs or food and drinks at participating merchants on Sentosa, or
• Free rides on Anywheel bicycles.

According to the joint press release, the collected rates for the RVMs have "increased steadily" every month.

From July to Oct. 2020, the collection rate for the Multi-Reward RVMs rose by 2.6 times.

Additionally, about one in five users of the Multi-Reward RVMs chose the "No Rewards" option when they recycled their drink containers.

"These findings suggest that there is greater environmental awareness among users and recycling habits are starting to form among members of the community," the press release stated.

Overwhelming response previously

The RVMs initially received overwhelming response.

People would bring by sacks of empty cans and bottles to exchange for discount vouchers.

Some of the machines also malfunctioned perhaps due to overuse.

Many machines also reached capacity much faster than they could be unloaded.

In response to this oversupply, the incentive was adjusted from S$0.20 for four containers to S$0.20 for 20 containers.

Starting young

Under the initiative, five RVMs were also placed in five primary and secondary schools till Nov. 2020.

The aim was to inculcate the habit of recycling in children from a young age.

Over 20,000 drink containers were collected during the programme's first run, despite the closure of schools during the circuit breaker.

The second run of this RVM School Education Programme will start from Jan. 4, 2021, and will last till May 28. RVMs will deployed to five different primary and secondary schools.

To further manage Singapore's packaging waste, NEA will be introducing a Deposit Refund Scheme (DRS) for beverage containers by 2022.

Typically, under the DRS, producers will refund the take back of used beverage containers, and provide refunds to customers who return them at designated collection points.

The use of RVMs are one such collection channel for the implementation of the DRS.

NEA will build on the experiences of the Recycle N Save initiative to develop a DRS framework for Singapore.

Totally unrelated but follow and listen to our podcast here

Top photo from NEA and recyclensave.sg