In order to stem the financial bleeding of existing recycling programs, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) will carry out a large-scale verification operation to ensure that the production amount declared by the manufacturers of recyclable containers was accurate, officials said yesterday.
The action was in response to criticism from legislators, who last month condemned the EPA for failing to manage recycling programs effectively. The program, run by the EPA's Recyclable Resources Foundation (資源回收基金會), has lost more than NT$2 billion to date, doubling its losses since last year.
EPA officials said yesterday that the foundation had worked with accountants in March and April to verify the amount of PET bottles (保特瓶) manufactured -- in order to determine whether production levels matched refund figures.
According to recent EPA statistics, the number of PET bottles collected nationwide far outnumber the amount manufactured. Foundation officials suspect that a number of dishonest merchants could be importing bottles from abroad in order to cash in on the refund policy.
Additionally, some of the bottle manufacturers have reportedly understated their production in order to pay less in required fees to offset the refund money paid to consumers by the EPA.
EPA officials discovered that 56 firms failed to declare the correct amount of bottles produced and owed the foundation a total of NT$97 million.
Strict verification over the past two months forced manufacturers to declare the true amount they manufactured, EPA officials said, adding that the total declared far exceeded the total for the same period last year.
EPA officials also said that because of these efforts, the foundation had made a profit for the first time in three years -- totalling NT$6 million.
The next stage will be to explore the use of a compulsory recycling logo on recyclable containers, according to the EPA. To date, EPA inspectors have discovered that containers for 53 different types of goods lack such a logo, and have vowed to investigate the sources in a bid to discover whether the container manufacturers or importers had declared their goods and paid the required handling fees.
Meanwhile, legislators say they will soon propose a draft law to enforce recycling policies.
At a public hearing held yesterday at the Legislative Yuan, KMT legislators said that the draft would compel container manufacturers and importers to deposit money into Taiwan's recycling fund.
Those firms failing to fulfill the obligation, legislators said, would be fined as much as NT$1 million or be forced to close down.
KMT legislator Chang Tsai-mei (張蔡美) said that recycling waste efficiently was one of the hallmarks of a developed country.
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