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Govt orders closure of open dumping sites
To push local administrations to improve waste management, the Environment Ministry is threatening criminal charges against regional authorities that do not adhere to the waste processing standards imposed by the law.
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Motorists ride by a pile of trash on Wednesday in South Tangerang, Banten. (Antara/Muhammad Iqbal)
T
he Environment Ministry has urged regional administrations to suspend or close landfills that are not processing waste and turn them into sanitary facilities. The ministry has also threatened local authorities with criminal charges should they fail to better manage waste.
The country’s waste management system is centered around landfills. The 2008 Waste Management Law requires every region to manage waste at sanitary landfills rather than in open dumping sites.
In open dumping sites, waste is piled and disposed of in a way that is not environmentally friendly, increasing the risk of fires, trash avalanches and other health hazards. At a sanitary landfill, waste is buried to accelerate decomposition and prevent it from burning or becoming a source of disease.
But of 550 final trash disposal sites (TPA), only 20 percent have installed proper waste disposal and processing facilities, according to the Environment Ministry’s monitoring of nationwide waste facilities.
The ministry warned local authorities managing the remaining landfills to close the open dumping sites or transform them into sanitary landfills, depending on the existing spaces.
“We have issued administrative sanctions [of operation termination requests] to 343 disposal sites,” the ministry’s waste management director Novrizal Tahar told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
Read also: Indonesia set to miss 2025 waste management target by wide margin
