Greenpeace calls for reusable cup system at Hong Kong’s Kai Tak Sports Park

Greenpeace is urging the Hong Kong government to introduce a reusable cup system at the new Kai Tak Sports Park after finding the main stadium alone could generate up to 1.2 million disposable items in its first year of operations.

The green group on Monday also said that the Environmental Protection Department should strengthen its waste reduction guidelines for event organisers to help restrict the use of single-use cups and containers during mega-events.

“We think that the government should be the one to set a good example, so we suggest Kai Tak Sports Park should be the first one to establish a well-designed borrow-and-return cup system,” Greenpeace campaigner Leanne Tam Wing-lam said.

“We hope that Hong Kong could be a mega-events hub, rather than a city which generates so much waste to our landfills.”

The HK$30 billion (US$3.84 billion) Kai Tak Sports Park, which comprises a 50,000-seat main stadium and two other smaller facilities, is a centrepiece of the government’s efforts to become a mega-events hub.

Greenpeace earlier raised concerns when it emerged that spectators had been barred from bringing their own water bottles to the site during a rugby match, one of several trial events ahead of its official opening on March 1.