Global Forum for Sports and Environment
Reuse-a-CupLook at a professional sports arena after a game, and the one item that stands out among the scattering of garbage and overflowing recycle bins, will probably be disposable paper or plastic cups. However, a system already exists and is successfully being run that can eradicate this problem - the reusable cup system. Aiming at creating a sustainable society, Germany has already introduced a reusable cup system that involves paying a 4 marc deposit on the cup, which is then collected and cleaned after use. In cities and provinces that have introduced this system, garbage has been reduced by up to 60-percent. Oita Sports Park 21 in Oita prefecture, Japan has introduced a similar system, on a trial basis. Within the park is Oita Stadium (affectionately named 'Big Eye'), home to Oita Trinita Football Club, which attracts about a million fans a year. At an average soccer game, 2-3 tons of garbage is collected, more than half of which is made up of paper cups. That works out to about 12,000 cups during a summer game, or about 160,000 cups a year. Although the potential for reducing garbage levels is apparent, the issue is not so cut and dry. Research needs to be conducted to weigh up the advantages of reusing the cups against the environmental burden of transporting and cleaning them, by means of a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). Present data however, suggests that the overall environmental burden is less with the new system, where cups can be reused up to twenty times. Oita Stadium, which flies the Ecoflag as a symbol of its commitment to the environment, has made a bold step towards changing our attitudes to using and disposing of materials, and is helping to make sports the leading field for increasing environmental awareness and action. 
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