Japanese Panasonic maker Matsushita seeks to recycle electronics gear.

Byline: Boonsong Kositchotethana

Nov. 2--Although they make their living digging through mountains of refuse, Nobutaka Tsutsumi and his subordinates regard themselves "treasure hunters", not scavengers.

The plump Japanese executive in his early 50s leads a 150-strong workforce which in the financial year to March disassembled and recycled some 700,000 discarded TVs, refrigerators, washing machines and air-conditioners, returning half of all that junk to good use.

Mr Tsutsumi is the president of Matsushita Eco Technology Center Co (Metec), part of Matsushita, the world's largest producer of consumer electronics.

Best known for its Panasonic brand, the company runs a high-tech facility for the recycling of consumer electrical appliances.

Occupying a 38,570-square-metre site surrounded by rice paddy fields about 100 km northwest of Osaka, the two-storey facility, built at a cost of five billion yen, is one of 45 home appliance recycling plants that ...