A plan has been hatched to stop the public sweeping of open areas and on ground levels of housing estates in Singapore one day a month, starting from as early as 2022.

Already started

The campaign, which is in the works to be ramped up to become a monthly affair, has already kicked off on Sunday, April 25, 2021.

All 17 town councils took part in the initiative whereby the surroundings were not swept from 6am to midnight as part of the annual Keep Clean, Singapore! campaign.

Campaign to show amount of litter generated

The Public Hygiene Council (PHC), which is the agency behind the idea, said the campaign kicked off with the "SG Clean Day" initiative to show "how much litter there is and what it will be like if there was no one to sweep it all away".

It added that it is in talks with the town councils to step up "SG Clean Days" to once every quarter in 2021.

Eventually, the plan is to have it once every month by 2022.

Residents can clean estate

But it is not a matter of giving cleaners time off or letting the estate go to the dogs.

"Residents will then be encouraged to volunteer picking up litter around their neighbourhoods, in small groups of eight," the agency added.

Getting volunteers to do clean-up

Activating volunteers will also be the focus for an upcoming May 29 event ahead of World Environment Day.

The PHC has planned the BlockWalk, an event where volunteers will be spread out across Singapore to pick up litter in neighbourhoods and community spaces, such as void decks, playgrounds and parks.

It will be the largest neighbourhood clean-up event of the year.

The aim is to rally 300 to 1,000 volunteers with their stakeholders and partners, in partnership with Habitat for Humanity Singapore.

Other initiatives revived

Moving forward, PHC will revive the Buddy Clean workshops to encourage students to take personal responsibility by cleaning up after themselves in public.

It is one of several outreach efforts that were paused due to Covid-19 restrictions.

PHC will also take over the SG Clean Quality Mark certification of premises under the National Environment Agency (NEA), and will continue the certification and re-certification of NEA premises in 2021.

Top photo via Kindness SG