Hong Kong’s Lunar New Year fairs generate 362 tonnes of rubbish

Celebrating Chinese New Year is a very messy business, it seems.

By 5pm yesterday, Hong Kong’s Food and Environmental Hygiene Department collected an estimated total of 362 tonnes of refuse from 15 Lunar New Year fair sites across the city.

How you estimate what 362 tonnes of rubbish looks like is beyond us, but we guess they’ve had practice.

Assuming the figure is indeed correct, that’s roughly 59 tonnes more than last year. Who would have thought sheep/goats would create more mess than horses?

Victoria Park was by far the muckiest pup, generating 129 tonnes of crap all by itself and requiring a team of 240 people and 42 refuse and cleaning trucks to bring it back up to scratch.

Don’t fret about the massive generation of waste too much though, as much of the paper and plastic will be recycled, as will about nine tonnes of bamboo and wooden planks.

More than 1,000 unsold plants will also be delivered by volunteers to Hong Kong’s elderly homes and hospitals.



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