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Green Iftar, '#RamadanHijau' campaign to reduce iftar waste
A South Jakarta mosque and an online movement are campaigning for a greener Ramadan this year by reducing the waste produced from iftar meals.
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Workers at the canteen of Istiqlal Grand Mosque in Central Jakarta pack iftar meals into carton food boxes on Saturday. The grand mosque serves up to 4,500 people for iftar each day, contributing to the capital's waste problem. (JP/Dames Alexander Sinaga)
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akartans are no stranger to the mountain of trash produced during Ramadan at the end of every bukber (short for buka bersama; breaking-of-the-fast together). Carton and styrofoam boxes, plastic cups and cutlery, and, of course, food waste dominate the trash.
The Burj Al Bakrie Mosque in Kuningan, South Jakarta, is trying to prove otherwise by taking the Muhammadan saying, "cleanliness is part of faith", to the next level with its Green Iftar program.
The Burj Al Bakrie, which is located on the basement floor of the Bakrie Tower on Jl. H.R. Rasuna Said, is the first mosque to implement such a program.
The program is initiated under the EcoMasjid movement of the Indonesian Ulema Council’s (MUI) Glorifying the Environment Body (LPLH-MUI).
“We have been conducting the Green Iftar [program] for three years now,” LPLH-MUI head Hayu Prabowo told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.
Hayu said that the Burj Al Bakrie was selected to run the program, as it was closest to his workplace.
“We realize that the environmental issue is about not only the lack of regulation, but also moral and ethics. Religion plays an important role in it. We are using an MUI fatwa as its foundation,” he said, referring to MUI Fatwa No. 47/2014 on waste management.
