KEY POINTS:
One man's trash is another man's treasure, the old maxim has it. And, even if the wording could do with a gender-neutral rewrite, the sentiment holds good.
So it's puzzling to hear people complain that the biennial inorganic waste collections are turning streets into rubbish dumps. For a start, far from everything that householders place at the kerbside for collection is rubbish. That's why the piles are so enthusiastically picked over before the official pickup. Calling these early arrivals scavengers - a distasteful term applied to animals that eat the leftovers when predators have had their fill - does them a disservice; they are members of a recycling chain that ensures that nothing goes to the landfill until it is of no use to anybody. In an ideal world, unwanted items that are still useful, serviceable or in working order would be delivered to needy organisations either directly or through recycling networks like www.donate.nz.co.nz that usefully match supply to demand. But many people who have neither the time nor the inclination to take such steps appreciate the service provided by the collections, and the increase in the amounts collected show that the demand is there.
For the same reason the mooted "resource recovery parks", are an intelligent alternative but not a substitute. Not everybody has a trailer and the free time to fill it.
The inorganic collections are part of a system of rubbish and recycling collections that we should be seeking to improve. Of course it's regrettable that the system is abused by illegal dumpers who ignore the rules. But that's no reason to abolish it. The roadside ad hoc recycling is a noble tradition that rewards initiative and reduces waste. Leave it alone.
