Martin Li

    martin.mouse@163.com

    SHENZHEN’S draft regulation on garbage reduction and sorting requires restaurants to install obvious public signs that advise diners not to order excessive amounts of food.

    The draft regulation was discussed at Friday’s hearing, which lawmakers, resident representatives and representatives of property management companies attended.

    Restaurants should also offer to pack up customers’ unfinished food, according to the draft.

    Most restaurants in the city don’t actively offer to package unfinished food for people to take home unless it is requested by diners.

    “If restaurants take an initiative in doing so, people might be reminded not to order too much next time,” a Futian resident, Zhang, told Shenzhen Daily yesterday.

    In addition, restaurants will be forbidden to ask for minimum order amounts.

    The draft law also requires residents to dispose of their domestic garbage in designated trash cans during fixed time periods each day.

    The draft law classified domestic garbage into three types: recyclable, hazardous and other.

    People could be fined 50 yuan (US$8.20) for the first time they dispose of garbage without sorting it. The fine would be 100 yuan for the second time and 200 yuan for the third, according to the draft law.

    “The intention of the fine is good, but how can it be implemented?” said Zhang, who lives in a building in central Futian.

    Zhang said different trash cans are already installed in his apartment complex, but most people still put all of their trash into a single can.

    “Is it possible for someone to stand by the trash cans to supervise and give fines?” said Zhang.

    Garbage classification is being piloted at selected residential communities in the city, unsuccessfully in many cases but successfully in some, according to previous reports by local Chinese-language newspapers.