7/17 China:Greenpeace Demands US Take Rubbish Back

[the.greenbase@green2.greenpeace.org]

----------
Original-TO:      World Press (Green2:Green2:Gnl:INET)
Original-TO:   The.Greenbase@green2.greenpeace.org
----------
ATLANTA WASTE DUMPED IN CHINA-GREENPEACE DEMANDS THE USA TAKES
ITS RUBBISH BACK
 
Press Release-Hong Kong, July 17, 1996 (GP) Greenpeace has
uncovered a trail of paper and plastic indicating that waste
now rotting onboard a cargo ship in Hong Kong harbour has come
from Atlanta, host of the 1996 Olympics.  The 200 tonne
shipment of plastic waste, including thousands of shopping
bags from the giant Winn-Dixie supermarket chain, is part of a
trend to use Asia as a dumping site for US waste 
disguised as "recycling".
 
"In Atlanta they want to break world records.  Instead they
are breaking environmental law," said Clement Lam Hau Keen of
Greenpeace in Hong Kong.  
The Winn-Dixie waste was refused by Chinese officials.  China
is clamping down on waste trade since they passed tough new
environmental laws in support of the international Basel
Convention, which restricts waste shipments from developed to
developing countries.  The US has failed to become a party to
this Convention.  Attempted import of wastes covered by
China's national ban are illegal.
 
Thousands of plastic bags were returned to Winn-Dixie in
Atlanta by customers who were promised the plastic would be
recycled. A shipment of the bags and other plastic products
was brokered by ICP Industries, a New York waste trading

company.  The waste was shipped from Los Angeles through Hong
Kong to China.  
The consignment of plastic was contaminated by household waste
including dirty soft drink cans, metal fittings and rotting
food.  Chinese officials in the port of Fuzhou refused to
allow it to be unloaded.  The ship is now in Hong Kong where
it was also refused permission to unload.  It has been
languishing in the harbour since July 2 with the crew
surrounded by the stench of rotting waste.  
Greenpeace contacted Winn-Dixie headquarters in Jacksonville,
and called on the company to take the trash back to the United
States.  
"We hoped Winn-Dixie, as a leading supermarket chains in the
US, would be a responsible corporate citizen," Mr. Lam said. 
"Instead they are shirking their moral obligation to take back
their rubbish and not dump it in Asia.  
"But Winn-Dixie claims it's not their responsibility, and has
rejected what we see as the only honourable course of action. 
If this attitude is prevalent in US corporations, developing

nations can expect much more US waste to show up in future."
--30--
CHRONOLOGY OF THE SHIPMENT AVAILABLE FROM GREENPEACE IN HONG
KONG PICTURES AVAILABLE FROM SAM CHAN, PICTURES EDITOR, SOUTH
CHINA  MORNING POST +852 2565 2281

----------