In a bid to control the nation's growing problem with food wastage, the South Korean government has started a unique initiative – "Pay as You Trash". Residents are required to separate their food waste from the rest of their trash and dump it separately in a centralised bin. And in order to access the bin, they actually need to pay by the kilo!
為控制國內不斷加重的食物浪費問題，韓國政府推出了一項特別舉措——“為食物垃圾買單”。民眾需要單獨歸類食物垃圾并傾倒在集中垃圾箱里。但要想打開垃圾箱，他們得按重量交費！

As of now, the South Korean government has three methods in place to charge citizens for the food thrown away. One is through an RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) card – when users tap this card – embedded with their personal tag – over a specially designed food waste bin, the lid will open, allowing them to dump their waste. This waste is automatically weighed and recorded in the user's account. The user needs to settle this bill on a monthly basis. Each RFID bin costs 1.7 million won ($1,500) and can cater to 60 households.
截至目前，韓國政府已推出三種垃圾收費方式。第一種，通過無線射頻識別（RFID）卡繳費——當使用者將載有個人信息的識別卡置于專用食物垃圾箱上方時，箱蓋會感應開啟，此時使用者可將垃圾投入箱中。用戶倒入的垃圾將被自動稱量并記錄在賬號中，并按月結清費用。每個RFID垃圾箱價值170萬韓元（約合1500美元），可供60戶家庭使用。

The second billing method is through pre-paid garbage bags. These specially designed bags are priced based on volume. For instance, in Seoul, a 10-liter garbage bag costs around 190 won (less than $1). There's also a bar code management system in place, in which residents deposit food waste directly into composting bins and pay for it by purchasing bar code stickers attached to the bin.
第二種，通過預付費垃圾袋繳費。這種特別設計的垃圾袋按容量計價。如在首爾，一個容量10公升的垃圾袋要價約190韓元（不到1美元）。最后一種方式是條形碼管理系統。民眾可將食物垃圾直接倒入未分類垃圾箱中，再掃碼購買垃圾箱上附著的條形碼貼紙即可。

Nearly every residential complex in the nation is equipped one of these three payment systems. Even before the pay-by-weight system was introduced, South Koreans were still being charged for food waste – the cost was simply divided equally among the tenants of each apartment block. The new system is not only fair, but is also designed to make consumers really feel the pinch of excessive waste. The more food they toss out, the more they end up paying.
在韓國，幾乎每個居民區都配備了以上三種方式之一的支付系統。其實在引入按重計費系統之前，韓國就已經開始對食物殘渣進行收費——費用只是單純平攤在每個小區的用戶上。新系統不僅強調公平，還使消費者真正意識到過度浪費的不良影響。食物浪費得越多，費用繳納得越多。

And it's working – residents like Seoul housewife Ms. Kwan are now adopting innovative methods to avoid food waste. She makes sure to strain all the liquid out of leftover food before throwing it away. She also separates fresh produce and other food items into smaller portions so that only the required amount of ingredients are used up per meal. While prepping vegetables, she tries to make use of as much as the edible parts as possible, in an effort to minimize waste.
這項舉措正在奏效——現在，像家住首爾的家庭主婦關女士等居民都采取了創新方法防止食物浪費。在將食物殘渣扔進垃圾袋前，關女士一定會將其中的水分瀝干，她還會將食材分成若干小份，確保每餐只吃需要的份量并做到光盤。此外，在準備蔬菜時，關女士會盡可能留下可食用的部分，這樣也減少了浪費。

"Because I'm worried about the disposal fees, I'm more careful about food waste now," she said. "Our food waste has become much less than before."
她表示：“我這么做是因為擔心垃圾費，現在我對食物垃圾更上心了，我們的食物垃圾比以前少很多。”

"People used to buy a lot of food and throw away leftovers without much care," said Yu Gwang Mo, a government official from Seoul's Mapo district. "After realising they have to pay for how much they throw, they have started to control their food purchase."
俞光謨是首爾麻浦區的一位政府官員，他表示：“人們習慣購買許多食物，肆意浪費剩飯剩菜。知道扔多少垃圾花多少錢以后，他們開始控制食物消費。”

"I think it's a good idea," added Mapo housewife Cho Sung Ja, "because people started to pay more attention to how much trash they throw and there's now less food waste and the trash bin area has become cleaner too."
麻浦區一位家庭主婦趙成雅也補充道：“我認為這項措施很好。因為人們開始注意自己丟了多少垃圾，食物垃圾變少了，垃圾箱都變得更干凈了。”

Restaurants and other food-based businesses are also actively trying to reduce their pay-by-weight disposal bill, by their own food waste processor – a machine that converts food scraps into dried powder that can be used as fertilizer. Some restaurants are actively trying to reduce the amount of food they waste by donating leftovers to the poor and hungry.
餐館和其他食品行業也積極減少按重計價的賬單。他們把食物垃圾放入處理機中，將這些殘羹剩菜轉化為脫水粉末用作肥料。一些餐館還向貧窮饑餓者提供剩菜剩飯以減少食物浪費。

According to official surveys, food waste in South Korea accounts for 28 percent of total waste by volume. 30 percent of this comes from leftovers, while 5 percent of the wasted food is thrown away uneaten. In smaller restaurants, leftovers account for 68 percent of all food wasted. Disposing this kind of waste costs the government a whopping 800 billion won per year. Through various initiatives such as "Pay as You Trash", the government has managed to cut food waste from 5.1 million tons in 2008 to 4.82 million tons in 2014.
根據官方調查顯示，食物垃圾占到韓國垃圾總量的28%。其中30%是剩飯剩菜，5%是原封未動的食品。在小餐館，剩飯剩菜占到了所有食物垃圾的68%。韓國政府每年要花費8000億韓元（合人民幣45.6億元）處理這類垃圾。通過“為食物垃圾買單”等各類舉措，政府已成功將食物垃圾從2008年的510萬噸降到2014年的482萬噸。

Vocabulary

cater to: 為……服務

英文來源：odditycentral
譯者：陳弘蕾
審校&編輯：丹妮