Panel Discussion (E-Waste)

#Preface:

This is the group oral presentation given in my semester 3, 

so I will use English to update my blog to share my experience about this panel discussion. 

Also, I will insert some general points about what we had presented.

This is my very first experience to have panel discussion assignment with my classmates. Sincerely, I did not clear with how panel discussion was conducted. What I knew was there were moderator and experts sitting next to each other, discussing a topic together in front of the audiences based on their knowledge and researches.

After we formed four groups, each in four, we drew the number to decide the presentation sequence. Luckily, we were the second group, that's mean we can perform this discussion before the Chinese New Year and can enjoy the one week holiday well!

One of my group members had found an interesting topic before. After discussing among lecturer and us, we chose electronic waste (as known as e-waste) as our topic as suggested. We got our core topic already, so we start to think the thesis statement of this topic. Finally, we decided our discussion topic which was should recycling of e-waste be compulsory in the future.

 

Before we started to search for information, we promised together that we will take this discussion seriously to achieve good marks together.

Yeah, it looked like we were doing something crazy?

Chill and just continue to read. (￣▽￣)"

Since we set the scope to the recycling of e-waste, we started to find the suitable position of panels related to this topic such as the particular representative from Malaysia, manufacturer and NGO (Non-government Organization). For the position of the host, we fixed it as the representative of WHO (World Health Organization) which related the e-waste to the health. After few changing of positions, there were representatives from Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Samsung electronics manufacturer, sounds interesting right?

When we decided our own position of panels, my group members recommended me to become the host because of having better ability to understand and arrange the flow of the whole thing. I was hesitated at first as I felt anxious that I cannot handle this position. The host was the most important role in conducting the flow of the whole discussion. Since my members believe in me, I accepted this challenge!

After that, we started to find the information from Internet together. We gain so much information and knowledge that we didn’t know about e-waste. For us, this was a very new topic and less discussed in Malaysia. Once we found some websites, articles or news, each of us started to read and take out the important points. That’s didn’t mean we only found what we need; we shared the information together so our points won’t clash.

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Do you know that there are collection points within Malaysia for you to throw the broken electronic devices for further recycling?

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Let’s have a look about e-waste. Based on the Step Initiative.com, e-waste is a term used to cover all electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) and its parts that have discarded by its owner as waste without the intent of reuse. Basically, there are six categories of e-waste which are the temperature exchange equipment, screens, lamps, small IT, large equipment and small equipment.  

 

This is an estimated amount of e-waste generated done by United Nation University. As shown, there is an increase of e-waste generated as the population size increases in years. Based on the report done by Natural Resources and Environment Ministry, Malaysians throw away one million tonnes of each year. This is not a good sign!

For my job, I have to understand all the things searched by my members briefly so that I can set some questions to them to bring in the concepts one by one during the presentation. I also draft for the introduction part which includes the definition and why we discussed this topic. Then, I prepared the presentation slides to put in all the information or statistics requested from each of us to give a clearer image for audiences.

We took about one week to finish finding the information and prepare the slide for every one of us. Remember that my classmates and I had a steamboat night in the end of January? On the following day, we woke up earlier to continue our works. Honestly, we didn’t get quite enough sleep time in that week. (￣▽￣)”

We separated this topic into few parts. After introduction, we discussed the current conditions of the disposal of e-waste in some countries and compared their systems before we told about our own country. Also, we touched about the policy and management from Samsung electronics manufacturer.

In Malaysia, there was a Hazardous waste management program begun in 1989 and e-waste was listed as scheduled waste under the Environmental Quality Regulations 2005. This means that Malaysia do have proper management of e-waste as 138 of e-waste recovery facilities were distributed in whole Malaysia.

Then, we related this topic to how be the process of recycling of e-waste and how disposal of e-waste may cause health problem. 

We also found that the improper way of refining the materials from e-waste can cause health risks which may result from direct contact with the harmful chemicals such as lead, cadmium, chromium, flame retardants, toxic fumes. Moreover, there is a study published in Environmental Research Letter Journal that shows the air pollutant may cause inflammation in lungs and increase in oxidative stress which is also associated with other diseases such as cardiovascular disease, DNA damage and even cancer.

Lastly, we discussed about the challenges that we are facing now and suggested some solutions to emphasize the importance of this topic before we ended it. We prepared the whole thing already and needed to rehearsal at least once before we presented.

Although each authority had put in efforts in improving the recycling system with existing plans, there were many challenges that all authorities have to face with as the statistics shown before doesn’t support this well. There are challenges that affect the effectiveness. For us, we do not have enough awareness and understanding about e-waste, we just simply throw away the things when it is broken or not functioning well, same for electronic devices. For government, the regulations still haven’t completed enough to manage the e-waste. For manufactures, there is always problems occurred for the e-waste supplies and fees to collect, transport, manufacture to reuse or recycle the e-waste.

Therefore, there were many measures that can be the opinions to make the e-waste recycling system compulsory in the future. These includes the organization of awareness and educational campaigns, enhancement of recycling technologies, branding and labelling the devices that can be recycled, improvement of regulations, increase of collection point and so on.

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It came to week 12, it was the time for us to present it. After the first group's presentation, the lecturer gave some advices to all of us to make sure we prepared well. The lecturer wanted us to truly understand and remember what we had found for our topics as the audiences may be new to that particular topic. We realized that there were some corrections needed in our slides as we knew that there were some information that are not related presented.

On that day, we stayed at university until 8 p.m. to add or delete some information in the slide and also our own drafts. The guard came and chased us away as we didn’t tell her earlier to book the time to stay late. We reached hostel at about 8.30 p.m. and we continue to do the work after eating some food.

On the next day morning, we reached the university at about 7 a.m. to rehearsal the whole discussion before the lecture started. I was very nervous as I knew I do not speak English as fluent as my classmates (they are native speaker but we aren’t). We comforted each other as we just do our parts well and receive the result together as we are one now. I felt touched.

I took a deep breath before I started the discussion and tried my best to express the words as set in the draft and then speak it loudly and slowly. Each of us just focused on their parts to give the correct information to audiences. Our whole discussion took about almost one hour because we shared the details of each part (supposed what the rules set is just around 30 minutes). During the Question and Answer session, we were ready for the lecturer and audiences asking the questions.

However, sometimes we didn’t know that we may have already paid the extra fee which is called Advanced Recycling Fee (ARF) when we purchase an electronic device. ARF is charged to cover the costs for collection, transportation and recycling. For what I know, California and Switzerland have practised this measure for years but Malaysia hasn’t yet.

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Every group has done the job well and we gained new knowledge from each presentation. The other topics that my classmates done were about the water system in Malaysia, the suitability of video games for children and teenagers as well as the haze problem in Malaysia.

After knowing our marks, we were very satisfied with the marks given. Suddenly I remembered that we haven't asked for the comments from lecturer due to the time constricted on that day. Our lecturer gave comments that the information we searched were very clear, but our language skills still need improvements and the way we presented can be done in a more interesting way so that the audience would feel bored easily.

We realized that we were too serious at that time until we did not relax ourselves and enjoyed the whole discussion well. (We all wore formal that day.)In addition, there should be more questions asked by me to link to the next point, not letting the each panel continue to present their points continuously.

For me, it is a breakthrough to me that I took the challenge to be a host in this panel discussion because of their trusts on me. I also thanked to my group members for working together to achieve this marks. Also, the comments can be our guidance for the next time.

We are happy because our teamwork and efforts paid off! \(^o^)/

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To conclude our discussion, we agreed that the recycling of e-wastes should be compulsory in the future. To make this success, the efforts from every field of experts as well as every one of us are necessary. Last but not least, Sen Heng Sdn. Bhd. had organized the e-waste campaign to recycle the e-waste instead of just throwing away. Kindly have a look to the image below!

 
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Thanks for browsing and hope you guys have a better knowing about the e-waste!

(This is the first blog post that the number of English words exceeds 1500, hope this post won't too clumsy !) (⊙o⊙)

 By the way, I am not sure which post will be the next, maybe the alumni dinner or the sharing of my foundation life experience or short trips. 

Feel free to leave some comment!

Stay tune!( •̀ ω •́ )y