Incheon University Hospital Funeral Hall to Stop Using Disposable Items... Leading Eco-Friendly Funeral Culture

Incheon University Hospital Funeral Hall Provides Reusable Containers
Photo by Incheon City

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Hyesook] All university hospital funeral halls in Incheon will stop using disposable products starting this month to promote an eco-friendly funeral culture.

Accordingly, Inha University Hospital, Gil Hospital, and Incheon St. Mary's Hospital will provide visitors with sterilized and washed reusable bowls, plates, cups, and utensils instead of disposable products starting from the 1st, while International St. Mary's Hospital will implement this from mid-month.

The Incheon city government will support the purchase of reusable containers for these funeral halls, award them with a plaque designating them as "Eco-friendly Resource Circulation Funeral Halls," and promote this initiative through their official website and social networking services (SNS).

Earlier, in November last year, the city signed a business agreement with the municipal Incheon Medical Center and these four university hospital funeral halls to create a "Disposable-free Funeral Culture." The Incheon Medical Center has already ceased using disposable products since May this year.

Funeral halls, which are representative businesses with high disposable product usage, are estimated to discard over 10 tons of disposable waste annually per location due to the convenience of using and discarding such items.

Companies provide disposable products bearing their logos to employees holding funerals, and the use of disposable products is even a mandatory item in contracts with funeral service companies, making disposable product use common in funeral halls.

Meanwhile, a survey conducted on the Incheon Medical Center funeral hall, which stopped using disposable products, showed that 76% of users expressed willingness to recommend the use of reusable containers to others, indicating a very high satisfaction with reusable containers over disposable products.

An official from Incheon city stated, "We plan to expand eco-friendly funeral halls without disposable products to private funeral halls as well. Additionally, we will continuously promote various policies to reduce disposable product use in daily life, such as establishing a reusable cup sharing system in cafes around city hall and revitalizing zero-waste markets."