Thursday, August 27, 2009

Informal Sector's Social Responsibility



I found some food stalls at the Ueno pedestrian shopping area, Tokyo. This is a common scene even in Malaysia, but what interested me is customers either have the food taken away or having there with simple seating. Wondering why, I decided to have a drink at the opposite stall with this grill chicken stall. After a while, I realised customers prefer to have their meal there as finishing the food required rubbish bin for disposal. Since 1962, prior to the Tokyo Olympic Game, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government decided to do away with the rubbish bins on the street and public area. The change of strategy in accordance to the principle of producer responsibility has changed the behaviour of people throwing rubbish in any where. Public has to bring back the rubbish or deposit the rubbish with the businesses. That's explain why customers prefer to have their meal in front of the small stalls, under public scrutiny and sunlight. Since Malaysian is fond with street hawker foods, perhaps we should adopt the same strategy in order to apply the principle of producer responsibility. I believe the hawkers do have social responsibility as the property owners are the one who funded the construction of food courts, part subsidise the maintenance and management of these food courts as well as bearing with pollution generated, if any. Thus, perhaps take back system for hawkers can be tried out.

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