80% Italian trash dumped into landfills
15.0% trash recycling rate (est.)
40 million tons trash illegally dumped
1 literary trash contest
Stereotypes would have silver-tongued Italians capable of waxing poetic about anything, but a literary contest on the subject of trash will perhaps put them to the test.
For the second year in a row the city of Reggio Emilia is asking local residents to write stories about ‘trash, recycling and transformation’ — aspiring bards who manage to say something captivating about that will receive a 500 euro cash prize. The lyrical words on banana peels, cardboard and coffee grounds will be collected into a volume, presumably printed on recycled paper.
The trash contest is meant to focus Italians on just how much they throw out and, although the numbers aren’t encouraging, they still make less waste than US counterparts– the Bel Paese averages three pounds of trash per person daily, opposed to the American average of 4.4 pounds per person per day. Italian officials are concerned, though, about an annual 3% increase in throw aways as locals adopt American-style packaging and lifestyles.
Italy also has the bane of the ‘eco-mafia’ a relatively new branch of organized crime which, among other things, is in the business of illegal waste dumping. Environmental group Legambiente estimated that each year, over 5,000 tons of eastern European radioactive metal waste is getting buried in Italy — for a profit estimated at six billion euro. And that’s something to think about…
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