Hotels, malls told to lead garbage management drive

Desy Nurhayati ,  The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Thu, 09/11/2008 11:02 AM  |  National

The government wants shopping malls, hotels and major retailers to quickly enact a recently passed waste management law, a minister says.

Environment Minister Rachmat Witoelar said here Wednesday the businesses must start using recyclable packaging for their products as required by the Extended Producers Responsibility (ERP) waste management system.

"Business units that organize the trade activities, including malls, hotels and major retailers, are the key that connects manufacturers and consumers. Without them, this EPR concept will not succeed," Rachmat told a seminar on the law.

"I also expect all manufacturers whose products potentially create garbage to implement the concept."

Rachmat said the law would give industries a year to formulate plans to enact the ERP system. "Within the next five years, they should have executed the concept and there should not be any open dumps."

The law is designed to take pressure off waste management services by reducing the sources of garbage in part by promoting recycling.

"The ERP concept will in turn benefit the businesses themselves.

"It is fully their responsibility to implement this concept, the government will only supervise it," Rahmat said.

Under the law, which was enacted in May, companies are required to use recyclable materials and provide labels indexing the materials used to package their products.

The law also stipulates that households are responsible for sorting their waste, and that local administrations must establish environmentally friendly waste management facilities and stop dumping in open areas.

To support the law, the government is currently drafting a list of regulations, which is expected to be completed early next year, said Gempur Adnan, the deputy minister for pollution control.

The regulations will certify the need for waste management facilities and will impose sanctions on businesses, households and local administrations that do not enact the law, he said.

The ministry estimates that about two million of seven million tons of hazardous waste and substances dumped in the country each year are untreated, resulting in damages to the environment and communities.

Many companies have cited the low capacity of existing waste treatment plants as a reason for their dumping untreated hazardous waste.

Chairman of the Indonesian Young Entrepreneurs Group (HIPMI) Erwin Aksa said manufacturers were aware it was their responsibility to establish waste treatment plants in their factories to ensure their operations were environmentally friendly.

He said the manufacturers welcomed the waste management law and were committed to effecting it.

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