| Kyodo) _ The industry ministry on Wednesday asked its advisory panel to examine new proposals on recycling such as financially assisting municipalities that collect and sort out garbage and charging shoppers for plastic bags distributed at supermarkets and other stores. The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry requested its Industrial Structure Council to study those proposals in the course of revising the Containers and Packaging Recycling Law. Together with the Environment Ministry, METI plans to encourage municipalities to step up efforts to reduce packaging waste by giving financial incentives. At present, businesses such as retailers and food and beverage makers shoulder recycling fees of packaging waste that has been collected and separated by local governments. In fiscal 2003, municipalities were estimated to have spent a total of 300 billion yen for collection and separation of garbage. Meanwhile, businesses paid about 45 billion yen in recycling fees in fiscal 2004, and the burden is expected to surpass 90 billion yen in fiscal 2010. As complaints from local governments suffering from fiscal deficits mount, the ministries suggest diverting 5 billion to 10 billion yen in payments from those businesses to municipalities, if the local governments succeed in reducing the amount of waste and thus cutting necessary recycling fees. METI suggests steering 5 billion yen to local governments, while the Environment Ministry proposes that up to 10 billion yen should be provided to the municipalities. Members of the METI panel failed to reach agreement on the new scheme during the council meeting Wednesday. Representatives of the businesses claimed they need to know how much money would go to local governments under the new system. METI pledged to present more details on the proposed new scheme for further discussion in mid-January. At the meeting, METI stressed the importance of raising consumer awareness on the need to reduce the disposal of plastic bags and encouraging them to bring their own shopping bags to supermarkets and other retail stores. METI also called for using plastic packaging waste as fuel for power generation when the amount of garbage exceeds recycling capacities. These proposals, if approved by the panel, will be written into a bill for amending the recycling law. The ministries hope to submit the bill to next year's regular Diet session. | 
