A civil society coalition, supported by 49 environmental groups, including the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) and Greenpeace, have launched a public awareness campaign on the serious menace of single-use plastic bags by showcasing a plastic monster. (Antaranews/Muhammad Zulfikar)
A civil society coalition of 49 environmental groups, including the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) and Greenpeace, launched a public awareness campaign highlighting the menace of single-use plastic bags by showcasing a plastic monster.
The plastic monster was displayed as a means of raising awareness among community members of the grave threat of marine debris akin to that posed by a dangerous monster, Chairperson of the Pandu Laut Nusantara (PLN) Prita Laura stated here on Saturday.
Several people are yet ignorant of the dangers posed by trash piles at sea to their lives. Hence, the community members need to be made aware of the fact that their daily lifestyle had contributed to the plastic waste crisis, she remarked.
Laura cited as an example the habit of utilizing single-use plastic cups and plates for drinking and eating.
Seconding Laura's views, Founder of the Indonesia Plastic Bag Diet Movement (GIDKP) Tiza Mafira noted that single-use plastic bags resembled monsters since despite the fact that they merely contributed 10 percent to Indonesia's total plastic waste, they had become a major contributor to marine debris.
Ironically, Laura cautioned that single-use plastic bags were made of materials that did not degrade for 100 years but were merely used for 30 minutes and then discarded.
As part of the civil society coalition's public awareness campaign, the participating environmental groups will not just demonstrate their stance by showcasing the plastic monster but they would also stage a peaceful rally in Central Jakarta on Sunday (July 21, 2019).
The participating activists would begin marching from Hotel Indonesia's Roundabout towards Jakarta's icon, the National Monument Square, by voicing their demand for the government's firm actions to tackle plastic waste.
The Supreme Court (MA) announced that regional governments have the right to ban single-use plastic, Mafira stated.
"Let us become serious in enforcing a ban on single-use plastic and comprehensively improve our waste management system," she emphasized.
Plastic manufacturers were also urged to come up with new-fangled ways of making single-use plastic that can be usable repeatedly, she revealed.
Plastic waste has, since decades, undoubtedly become a major problem in Indonesia amid the government's serious endeavors to deal with the menace by highlighting its detrimental impacts on the country's environmental sustainability.
Plastic waste, which has had a serious impact on the quality of soil and water and may threaten the existence of living creatures, is closely related to the amount of trash produced and used by Indonesians every day.
Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya has noted that some 9.8 billion plastic bags are used in Indonesia every year, and almost 95 percent of it will end up as waste.
The ministry's waste management directorate also estimated that the total number of plastic straws used by Indonesians daily reaches some 93 million, rising from nine percent in 1995 to 16 percent in 2018.
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