Every morning, Tian Wen Qui leaves his home under a bridge in Beijing to rummage through the city’s trash cans until nightfall for empty soda bottles, plastic cooking oil containers, and sauce bottles. soy that he places inside two sacks that he carries on his shoulder. On a good day, Tian typically earns $3 after selling his find at one of the city’s many garbage recycling stations. “Good mornings” are now few and far between.
A vast empire of garbage and junk
Garbage recycling used to be a multi-billion dollar business in China until it was shut down due to the global economic crisis and the resulting drop in commodity prices. Empty bottles are now selling for half the price of last summer.
The decline of the recycling industry has affected the lives of people like Tian, the people who pay him for collected waste products, and the manufacturers who turn these recyclable materials into usable items to sell in stores and construction areas around the world. the world. That’s why junk from the US and Europe that is sold in China is returned after potential customers reject it (no pun intended).
Since the Chinese consume less than Westerners, 70% of the garbage coming into the country to fuel its recycling business must come from abroad, said Wang Yong Gang, spokesman for the China National Resources Recycling Association.
The Chinese way of life basically adheres to economy and austerity, and they will resort to repairing things many times before throwing them away, Mr. Wang added.
The collapse in commodity prices was so sudden that steel and metal recyclables arriving by container ship at Chinese ports were priced well below what they were when they left the docks in Los Angeles, New Jersey or China. Rotterdam.
undervalued garbage
The port of Hong Kong is now home to numerous containers full of rubbish waiting to be claimed and collected by their owners, Mr Wang said.
According to the China National Resource Recycling Association, copper scrap, which used to sell for $8,000 a ton in 2007, is now $3,000. Tin is now down to $5 a pound from $300, while the price of paper has plunged by as much as 80%.
People in the recycling industry used to make money by sourcing other nations’ trash, but now hard times threaten China’s recyclers from every angle. Gao Zuxue owns and manages a small garbage collection depot with her family.
Gao revealed that his deposit used to bring in around $450 per month in 2007 when business was booming. Today, $80 is something to be thankful for, Gao said as he stood in a nearly empty room that was once littered with used radiators, old magazines and empty soda bottles.
People now refuse to sell their scrap to them because of their purchase price, which most think is ridiculously low, Gao said.
Who is taking out the garbage?
While some recycling industrialists say copper and plastic prices have improved slightly, they still expect tougher times due to the worsening economic crisis around the world.
The sentiment is also shared by residents of Bajia Khun, a small town built entirely on rubbish on the outskirts of Beijing. Looking at a virtual ghost town surrounded by mountains of stored schoolbooks, magazines and notebooks, Chen Xiaorong, a resident, recalls when hundreds of her neighbors used to make a living here from other people’s garbage.
According to Chen, people lost a huge fortune in recycling and decided to return to the countryside. His family, who used to earn $735 a month, will still get by here on $360.