CARDBOARD -[HONG KONG'S ELDERLY]- COLLECTORS

HONG KONG : Her fingers are bent from 20 years of collecting cardboard from Hong Kong's streets, but Au Fung-Ian says she has no desire to give up the gruelling work.

At 67-years-old she is one of around 2,000 collectors, mainly women over the age of 60, whose frail figures are a familiar sight, guiding trolleys loaded with cardboard through a city clogged with traffic and people.

They pick up discarded packing boxes from shops, markets and residential buildings, selling them for a few dollars to recycling depots, where cardboard is more  valuable  than plastic.

The depots then ship it abroad - up to 95 percent of it to mainland China in 2016, according to local authorities - as Hong Kong has no recycling plants of its own to convert it into usable materials.

However, as China closes the door to imported rubbish, even from semi-autonomous regions such as Hong Kong, Au's livelihood  is under threat.

Beijing no longer wants the country to be a  global trash can and has already phasing out taking solid waste  - a process it expects to complete by 2020.

Pragmatic Au says she tries not to think too much about her work drying up.

She continues to put in 14-hour days so she can afford a car for herself and her 77-year-old  husband, also a cardboard collector, when they finally decide to give up work.

''Some people think our work is arduous and look down on us. They say : 'You are so old, go home and enjoy life. Why collect cardboard?'' Au said.

''But if you can still work, I don't want to rely on others.'' [AFP]

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