Plastic waste: The blame is on us, convenience-minded consumers
Vincent Lingga / The Jakarta Post
Jakarta /
Mon, July 22, 2019
/ 09:06 am
A 3-year-old boy is helping his parents sorting the waste. (JP/Sigit Pamungkas)
Indonesia’s problem of plastic waste pollution is not the result of
the occasional rogue foreign shipment. It is caused mainly by each one
of us, the hundreds of millions of convenience-minded consumers who have
become so used to buying cosmetics, household detergents, water, eggs
in boxes and packaged food in single-use packaging.
When buying such products we don’t give a thought to what will happen
to the plastic after we discard it. Unless sorted and collected such
packaging will end up in a landfill where it will degrade only after 450
years, experts say, or, worse, find its way to the sea.
Recently, a few Asian governments intercepted imported shipments of
allegedly hazardous waste comprising household garbage, municipal waste,
hospital waste and electronic scrap. Indonesia itself has shipped five
containers of plastic wastes back from Tanjung Perak Port in Surabaya,
East Java, to the exporters in the countries of origin, mostly Western
industrialized nations.
Some of this waste had been misleadingly declared recyclable plastic
scrap and there is a likely connection between the sudden increase of
such shipments and the notification given by China to the World Trade
Organization in July 2017 that it would no longer import various kinds
of recyclable scrap. Since the early 1990’s China eagerly consumed 60
percent of the world’s recyclable scrap to fuel its manufacturing boom
and this sudden decision left scrap exporters scrambling to look for new
markets.
According to research by the United Kingdom-based Financial Times,
the countries that immediately stepped in to fill the gap left by China
were, in order of size, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Hong Kong, India,
Taiwan, the Netherlands, Turkey and Indonesia.
Politicians have found it fashionable to describe Asia as having
become the “dumping ground” for the waste of Western countries. However,
every shipment of recyclable plastic involves a buyer and seller.
No reputable recycling company wants to import scrap that has been
contaminated and no foreign government wants the embarrassment of being
forced to take back its own garbage.
However, in international trade there will always be rogue elements
all too ready to make a quick profit through fraudulent declarations.
Until recently the export of plastic scrap was not even covered by the
Basel Convention, so such exporters could not be prosecuted by their own
governments.
The main reason that China gave to the WTO for its decision to stop
importing scrap was because many shipments had been mixed with “dirty
waste” that could not be used as raw material and contaminated the
environment.
Fortunately this problem was recently addressed by the Basel Action
Network and in May 2019 the Basel Convention was amended to include
mixed and contaminated plastic scrap as “hazardous waste”. Indonesia
also signed the amendment that will come into force in January 2021.
Unfortunately the isolated cases of waste imports have resulted in an
unfair backlash against the import of plastic and other scrap needed as
raw material for the legitimate local recycling industry. The call for a
total ban on transboundary plastic scrap is a throwaway phrase that
does not acknowledge this important local industry.
In Indonesia a well-established reputable recycling industry employs
thousands of people. T
he Industry Ministry estimates Indonesia needs
600,000 tons of imported scrap a year and can potentially enjoy a
healthy trade surplus by exporting back recycled plastic pellets,
flakes, plastic chips and geotextiles for road construction.
Reputable foreign investors have entered this sector such as the
recent bottle-to-bottle recycling plant in East Java. At least one of
Indonesia’s largest producers of bottled water can now claim to use
bottles made out of 100 percent recycled local plastic.
However, the local recycling industry presently has no choice but to
continue to import plastic scrap because it is simply not able to
utilize the plastic waste produced by Indonesian consumers, owing to the
absence of efficient municipal waste collection, sorting and cleaning
systems.
Unless there is a demand from the consumer for biodegradable
containers, or for a reuse model in which all bottled liquids have to be
sold together with refills, the amount of single use packaging will not
decrease in the short-term. Indonesia should instead immediately
implement less challenging strategies.
We cannot expect consumers to sort their household waste or desist
from throwing it into the river for love of the environment. Even
Singapore, a model of urban cleanliness, has yet to convince residents
to sort their household waste. However, if householders are paid to sort
their waste as in the commendable Indonesian bank sampah (app-based garbage collection bank) scheme, already comprising over 7,000 banks, then they will do so.
Similarly, we cannot expect municipalities to find the funds for
recycling facilities. However, such funds would be readily available if
there was a regulation on a national program of extended producer
responsibility (EPR) in which the producer who delivers a product in a
single-use container must take responsibility for its end of life, and
make a small contribution to an ecofund for recycling infrastructure.
Such a program could also be extended to the less visible but more
serious problem of electric and electronic waste.
The EPR regulation could be part of a wider effort under Law No.
18/2008 on waste management to cut Indonesia’s waste output; it would
oblige producers and retailers to redesign their product packaging to
have a higher proportion of recyclable material. It will also require
that they take greater responsibility for the waste management of their
products.
