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ccording to the 2017 Food Sustainability Index published by the Economist Intelligence Unit in cooperation with the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition, Indonesia generates around 315 kilograms of food waste per person per year.

Meanwhile, around 20 million people in the country still face food insecurity.

Concerned about this disparity, the West Jakarta administration has taken measures to reduce the amount of organic waste being dumped in landfills through a program called Kampung Penanganan Sampah Terpadu (integrated waste management village).

The administration, cooperating with the Bank Indonesia on the procurement of supporting facilities, launched the program at the Wayang Museum in the Kota Tua area of West Jakarta on Monday.

West Jakarta Environment Agency head Edy Mulyanto told reporters during the launch that eight locations in eight subdistricts of West Jakarta had been designated as pilot projects.

One of those pilot projects, at the Bambu Larangan apartment complex, has in fact commenced about one-and-a-half month ago.

The subsidized apartment complex, designated for the agency’s workers, is situated in front of the Satu Hati waste bank, hence the residents are used to sorting out their garbage and sending inorganic waste to the waste bank.

Meanwhile, organic waste, mainly food waste, is still thrown into garbage carts.

Under the new program, Edy said, composters would be provided to treat organic waste at the household level, turning it into fertilizer.

“Almost 55 percent of 1,300 tons of waste generated in West Jakarta is organic waste that ends up in temporary disposal sites,” he said.

Bambu Larangan resident Patliyah, 37, said that, since the project commenced, she had got used to not throwing her family’s food waste into the trash can.

Instead, she was seen dropping a plastic container full of expired food — around a quarter kg —into an empty pink bucket located at the end of the first-floor corridor of the building.

“This is spoiled rice from last night. Rather than throwing it away [into the trash can], it is better to drop it into the composter drum,” she told The Jakarta Post, while pointing at three blue 150 liter-plastic drums besides the bucket.

“[Food waste] collected in the bucket will be stirred in with a mixture of effective microorganisms 4 [EM4] liquid fertilizer before being dropped into the composter drums,” she said.

Patliyah said she had initially been doing this because West Jakarta Environment Agency officials had told her to. By now, it has become a habit.

“My family’s food waste dumped into the garbage cart has been reduced,” she said.

West Jakarta produces around 1,300 tons of waste daily, contributing around 18,5 percent to the total 7,000 tons of trash produced in Jakarta daily.

At the outset of the program, Patliyah recalls, housewives in the area were unsure about having the composters on their corridors because of the possible stench smell and maggots.

“We were mostly concerned about maggots when our children play around in the corridor. Apparently, it’s not happening,” she said.

Putri Lestari, 37, another housewife in the area, said some residents were still unfamiliar with the new facility.

However, she reckoned more than half of the families inhabiting the two apartment towers, which house a total of 200 families, had utilized the composters made available on each floor of the five-story buildings.

Since the day the drums were first placed in her corridor, Nov. 8, Putri said the amount of food waste dropped into the drums at the first floor had reached at least 250 kg.

In the first two months, the amount collected from all five floors in the two apartment towers might reach 2.5 tons.

Yudiono, the head of neighborhood unit (RT) 13 in community unit (RW) 5 in Bambu Larangan, said some residents had benefited from the composter, saying it had produced as a byproduct light-brownish leachate liquid, which could be used as fertilizer for plants grown in the apartment complex.

“The liquid has been harvested since after the first two weeks. The solid [waste] is still [in the process of degrading to compost],” he said, adding that the amount of leachate generated might reach up to 25 liters per floor within two months. (sau)