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A launch ceremony for this year’s “dandelion public education campaign” was held yesterday morning at Shenzhen Book City CBD Store in Futian District to further attract more volunteers and teachers to help spread garbage sorting knowledge.

This year’s campaign included a special training program for school teachers to encourage them to promote garbage sorting education on campus.

Efforts will be made through the program to build a team of “dandelion teachers” dedicated to spreading garbage sorting knowledge on campus.

Each school will have at least one “dandelion teacher” as planned, according to the Shenzhen Municipal Urban Management and Law Enforcement Bureau.

Primary students stage a recital performance at the launching ceremony. DT News

Experts in the garbage classification field, including Liu Jianguo from the School of Environment of Tsinghua University, have been invited to provide training guidance for teachers under the program.

The “dandelion public education campaign,” first launched in 2018 by the bureau, aims to promote garbage sorting education across the city’s residential communities and schools through volunteer efforts.

With the name dandelion, it is hoped that through the campaign every citizen can become a practitioner and promoter of waste classification in a way just like how dandelions reproduce and spread themselves.

So far, the campaign has trained more than 300 volunteers. They have conducted over 1,000 events to promote waste classification education, involving more than 400,000 people, according to information released by the bureau.

During the launch ceremony, the country’s first booking system for garbage sorting classes developed by the city was put online. With the system, companies and residential compound communities can book through an online platform to enjoy free offline classes on garbage sorting.

A booking system to visit bases for popularizing knowledge of garbage sorting across the city, the first platform of its kind in the country, was also put online at yesterday’s ceremony.

Residents can use the system to not only book a visit, but also to check photos and the information of each base. Additionally, a navigation service is also linked with the system.

The two systems can be accessed from the WeChat account — mlszgzh.

The city will next explore an education mechanism and is considering allowing Grade 4 students to study waste classification knowledge.

The waste classification regulation drafted by the city will be implemented Sept. 1. Punishments will be issued for violators based on the regulation.