In Parliament: Use of drones to combat high-rise littering being considered

SINGAPORE: To address the long-standing issue of high-rise littering, the Government is studying the use of drones as a surveillance measure, said Senior Minister of State for Sustainability and the Environment Amy Khor in Parliament on Wednesday (Jan 8).

The National Environment Agency (NEA) received around 27,100 high-rises littering feedback on average in 2022 and 2023, said Dr Khor, who also noted that the problem has been on the decrease, given that in 2020 and 2021, the agency received around 33,500 instances of feedback.

In the vast majority (over 97 per cent) of 7,400 persistent high-rise littering cases between 2021 and 2023, the NEA deployed cameras.

However, in instances where camera deployment is unfeasible, the agency conducts enhanced educational outreach to affected households, stakeouts, and even additional investigations.

Dr Khor also said that the ministry will keep looking into other measures to help detect high-rise littering, including technological developments in video analytics, artificial intelligence, and enhanced enforcement capabilities.

These also include drone flights for high-rise littering surveillance.

“In addition, we will continue to strengthen partnerships with communities to develop localized solutions to address high-rise littering and urge residents to be considerate and not commit such acts, which is an anti-social behaviour that threatens public safety and hygiene,” she said.

A number of members of Parliament raised questions on the issue, with the People’s Action Party MPs Tan Wu Meng (Jurong) and Foo Mee Har (West Coast) asking specifically about advanced technologies and enforcement measures.

Dr Khor did admit that using drones does carry with it certain challenges that have to do with privacy issues, as well as the machines’ battery life.

“The important point to note really is that the use of surveillance cameras and other technologies really just to augment all the efforts we have put in to tackle high-rise littering, and it is a multi-pronged and holistic approach,” she said.

Therefore, technology is not the only solution to the issue of high-rise littering, said Dr Khor, who also underlined working with the community to come up with sustainable solutions that include changes in behaviour and collective responsibility for one’s environment.

In 2019, an elderly Muslim man was killed when a wine bottle was thrown out of a high-rise building and hit him on the head. Australian national Andrew Gosling threw a wine bottle from the seventh-floor lift landing of Spottiswoode 18 condominium in Aug of that year.

It hit the 73-year-old grandfather of nine, Nasiari Sunee, sitting with his family in the barbecue area of his housing block, about to eat dinner. Mr Gosling was given a five-year jail sentence for committing a rash act causing death. /TISG

Read also: “Never-ending high-rise littering” — Resident complains about building litterbugs; sparks outrage among Singaporeans