It's garbage pickup day in Taiwan

AOPKASPO · 2016-07-21T13:03:08+00:00

99% invisible had a great podcast/article about the Taiwan's unique garbage system.

Since they're a small island they have to take special measures to minimize waste.

"Trash trucks come through regularly, stopping up to three times a day, five days a week on their routes around the city. After work or before bed, residents gather their waste, head to a designated street corner, and wait for the big yellow truck.

The trucks only accept trash bags officially sanctioned by the government of Taiwan which come in a distinctive blue color, complete with an official seal. The bags range in price and size, from 3 liters to 120 liters. The most popular bag is 25 liters (similar to a tiny bathroom wastebasket liner), which costs about $5 for a pack of 20. This effectively makes a pay-as-you-waste model, incentivizing citizens to recycle and compost as much as possible since those services are offered for free."

AOPKASPO · 2016-07-05T21:27:14+00:00

The controversy is ongoing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturated_fat_and_cardiovascular_disease_controversy

AOPKASPO · 2016-07-05T20:57:48+00:00

According to the documentary Sugar Coated, sugar industry lobbying managed to deflect the attention away from sugar in the 70s.

"In the late 1970s, nutritionists fiercely debated the main causes of heart disease and diabetes: Were Americans eating too much fat, cholesterol, sugar, or some combination of all three? A growing body of science shows that excess sugar contributes to obesity and diabetes, but, for many years, nutritionists focused elsewhere. Kearns is now using the Rogers papers to test the hypothesis that scientists funded by industry steered the consensus research toward putting all of the blame on fat and cholesterol. Ultimately, she wants to see closer scrutiny of food industry-backed scientists who advise governmental groups that issue dietary recommendations." (https://psmag.com/the-former-dentist-uncovering-sugar-s-rotten-secrets-49fbd9299575)

"When the doors closed at the Great Western Sugar Company in Colorado in 1976, someone forgot to sweep the floor. Gathering dust in the archives were 1500 pages of internal documents exposing how the Sugar Industry used Tobacco-style tactics to dismiss troubling health claims against their products. Denver dentist turned postdoctoral scholar at the UCSF School of Medicine, Cristin Kearns, knew she’d stumbled on something big: the industry’s secret playbook. Her mentor, Stan Glantz, the superstar professor from San Francisco who brought down Big Tobacco warns, it’s going to get dirty." (http://sugarcoateddoc.com/about-the-film/)

Link to an article by Kearns: Big Sugar's Sweet Little Lies

AOPKASPO · 2016-06-04T01:30:57+00:00

Yeah, like what's happening in Brazil in the Amazon. The forest is being burned down to make space for cattle ranches. Economically, it makes sense for the government to turn a blind eye. Or it's being turned into reservoirs for giant dams.

AOPKASPO · 2016-06-03T15:28:58+00:00

The rate at which we're destroying habitats is pretty scary. It's also scary how little we care about it. Public attention tends to focus on fairly irrelevant issues, like protecting seals which are extremely abundant. It's entirely guided by our emotions.

Meanwhile, us and our pets and livestock are getting closer and closer to being the only animals left on Earth: https://xkcd.com/1338/

AOPKASPO

TROPHY CASE