THE government is planning to construct a centralised waste park in each state to house all recycling companies, Housing and Local Government Minister Zuraida Kamaruddin said today.

“All recycling factories will be put in the same park. So, after two years, waste outside the park will be considered as illegal,” she told reporters in the Parliament lobby.

Action will be taken against those operating outside the park after a grace period of two years, she added.

Zuraida said the ministry is in talks with state governments on suitable locations for the parks.

The ministry is also assessing if landfills can be converted into waste parks.

The plans come as Malaysia grapples with becoming the world’s garbage bin for plastic waste after China last year stopped imports of plastic waste.

There are also plans for each state to have a waste-to-energy (WTE) park, with larger states requiring more than one.

Each WTE plant will require a land size of between 4.04 and 8.09 hectares.

For states that do not have enough land to fit a WTE plant, Zuraida said the federal government will engage the state government on land allocation. – April 2, 2019