News Focus: MOST OF RI'S GARBAGE NOT DISPOSED OF PROPERLY

By Andi Abdussalam
Jakarta, Feb 21 (ANTARA) - About 79 percent of the estimated 176,000 tons of garbage urban Indonesians produce each day fails to be deposited properly but is thrown into rivers, onto parks or burnt at any convenient place due to the lack of waste transportation services and appropriate garbage dumps.
"Most of the garbage, which is not taken to dump sites due to the lack of refuse transportation services, is thrown into rivers, onto parks or burnt. When rain comes it worsens floods," Nugroho Tri Utomo of the Drinking Water and Environment Sanitation Networks, or AMPL, said on Thursday.
It is estimated that each person in Indonesia with its population of 220 million produces some 800 grams of waste per day.
"The national census in 2007 showed that about 55 percent of the garbage produced in urban areas and 95 percent in rural regions, or 79 percent on the national volume, was not picked up by cleanliness services," Tri Utomo said.
Data available at the office of the ministry of environment indicated that in 2007 the volume of refuse in 194 districts/ district cities reached 666 million liters or equivalent to 42 million kilograms. There are 477 districts/ district cities in Indonesia based on data in 2008.
Tri Bangun Laksono, acting assistant to the deputy of the environment minister for waste pollution affairs, said that about 14 percent of the 42 million kg rubbish, or about six million tons, were plastic junk.
In order to help overcome the waste problem in the country, the government is working out several government regulations in order to implement Law No. 18, 2008 on Waste Management. Based on the law, waste should be managed in such away so that in 2015 there would be no more piles of litter even if in dump sites, let alone in open places.
The government regulations carry provisions on waste sorting out facilities, labeling, producers' obligation, reduction of waste, compensation, incentives, management of specific waste, financing, impact and ban on importing waste.
Tri Bangun Laksono said that there were initially 11 draft government regulations being drafted to follow up Law No. 18 / 2008 but due to time constraint they were regrouped into three government regulations, namely on waste reduction, waste handling and management of specific refuse.
One of the government regulations concerns plastic bags. Environment Minister Rachmat Witoelar said his office would issue a regulation to restrict the use of plastic bags in Indonesia. "I will issue a regulation which provides details, including incentives and disincentives, for plastic bag producers," the minister said.
According to Slamet Daroyni, executive director of the Environmental Forum (WALHI), shopping centers are the main sources of plastic bag problems. "If in one day one million people go shopping with each bringing home three plastic bags, it means about three million plastic bags need to be disposed of every day," Raroyni said.
Therefore, he said, the government needed to think of alternative bags in carrying out its idea to restrict the use of plastic bags. After all, plastic bags are made of non-degradable, inorganic materials.
Based on data at the office of the ministry of environment, about 12,800 tons of waste are recycled daily, of which two percent or 204.16 tons are biodegradable or organic refuse. It has the potential to produce methane.
If the organic waste is processed into compost, it would have the potential to cut methane gas emission by 1.5 giga grams per annum that usually contributes to global warming.
With a rate conversion of 50 kg methane per one ton of biodegradable organic garbage, the potential methane emission is about 745.2 giga grams.
This rate is relatively small. Its contribution to global warming is only one percent compared with other contributors such as forest conversion, use of energy, transportation and agriculture. However, methane gas has the power to erode the ozone layer 21 times bigger than that of the carbon dioxide gas.
Therefore, the government should begin to seek suitable waste management system or at least applying the sanitary landfill system, a method of waste disposal with certain techniques so that it would not caused pollution and health problems.
In the meantime, the Gajah Mada University (UGM) in Yogyakarta in cooperation with Sweden is developing a waste management system that could be implemented in Indonesia, namely a waste refinery (WR) system.
"In implementing our program we will cooperate with a number of regional governments, government institutions and universities in Indonesia," Coordinator of UGM's WR Program Team, Dr Siti Syamsiah said.
She said that through the WR network the UGM hoped to share experience on waste and environment management with other regional governments in Indonesia.
Syamsiah said that the WR concept was a new paradigm in waste management where garbage was considered as a potential raw material to be recycled to produce new products with added values.
"Waste can be utilized as energy and be recycled to produce other types of goods. Sweden has been recognized as a successful country in managing its refuse," she said.
She said that the waste management in Sweden had been successful not only in processing waste into energy sources such as biogas and power energy but also in encouraging people to sort out rubbish with commercial benefits.
"About 40 percent of waste in Sweden is utilized to produce electricity and fuel oils for motor vehicles," she said.***3***