Research officer S. Mageswari (centre) and SAM members hope to pressure ResourceCo Asia (M) Sdn Bhd into returning the waste it has imported from Australia for the purpose of manufacturing fuel for a cement manufacturer, outside the plant in IGB Industrial Park in Ipoh today. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Wong Tuck Keong, October 15, 2015.Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM) wants stern action taken against ResourceCo Asia (M) Sdn Bhd for illegal trafficking of waste into the country.
Research officer S. Mageswari said following an anonymous tip-off, SAM had discovered that the company had imported solid waste from Australia for the purpose of manufacturing fuel for cement manufacturer Lafarge in Kanthan, Perak and Rawang, Selangor.
“SAM followed up with the Department of Environment (DOE) and was informed that it had sent the company a notice to return the waste to Australia.
“We want the authorities to take stringent action to send a message to other companies that may have acted similarly.
“Malaysia is not a dumping ground, the waste should return to Australia,” said Mageswar outside the ResourceCo Asia plant in IGB Industrial Park in Ipoh today.
She and several others had turned up with placards in a bid to pressure the company into obeying the DOE notice to return the waste, which importation is illegal under Article 9 of the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal.
Mageswari said according to the DOE’s letter to SAM in August, the company had classified the solid waste as solid fuel and failed to provide the environmental impact assessment of the process of turning solid waste into solid fuel.
“They should act fast or we will proceed to complaints to the Australian Embassy,” she said.
ResourceCo Asia general manager K. Muralindran said the company was already in discussions and cooperating with DOE on the matter.
“We have stopped importing waste material from Australia since being restricted in July by the DOE.
The appointment of former President of Manjung Municipal Council, Dato’ Zamri Man, as the new mayor of Ipoh on July 1 was well received by Ipohites.
As President of Ipoh City Watch (ICW), I am delighted to note that he is bringing with him his experiences from Manjung, the third best-managed local council in Malaysia, to Ipoh.
We are more delighted when he said his vision is to make Ipoh the most liveable city in Malaysia through an inclusive administrative system. That is exactly what we are striving for at ICW.
When asked by reporters on his first day of work, Dato’ Zamri has made known his intention of working with NGOs and civil society groups to solve the various issues plaguing Ipoh. He hoped to improve the city in a year’s time, in terms of cleanliness and other criteria set under the state government's Amanjaya policy.
Just three weeks ago The Economist reported the results of a liveability survey on 140 cities in the world. Melbourne has once again emerged as the most liveable city in the world for the fifth consecutive time based on a set of 30 criteria which include safety, healthcare, educational resources, environment and infrastructure. Kuala Lumpur, Penang and Johor Baru are ranked at the bottom half of the list with Tripoli, Lagos, Port Moresby, Dhaka and Damascus listed as the five least liveable cities.
Comparing Ipoh with Melbourne is unfair, as we are at a different end of the continuum. However, it is not a sin to make Ipoh the most liveable city in Malaysia. Two pertinent issues that affect Ipohites are economy and safety, which are part of the liveability survey variables. In terms of safety and security, ICW is working closely with the Police and other NGOs to provide feedback and ways to improve the city’s security.
Economy will improve when we have a good business-and-industry-driven environment coupled with good policies that can attract investors. We need good infrastructure such as a good transportation system. Ipoh’s reasonably cheap and good food is already a plus point. However, the rise in dengue cases will be a pull-down factor. We too hope this is not the reason why it is so difficult to get dengue statistics on cases affecting each housing area within Ipoh. But what we do know is that the number of dengue cases is correlated to the number of illegal dumpsites, clogged drains, overgrown grass and abandoned houses.
Maybe comparing Ipoh with Los Banos and Tuguegarao, two small cities in Philippines, will be fairer. Both are slightly smaller than Taiping. What fascinated me during my recent visit there was the level of cleanliness. They are definitely very clean. I could not find one single illegal dumpsite for which Ipoh is famous.
I had the opportunity to speak to the head of environment of Los Banos’s Local Council and we shared our experience in managing solid waste. To start off, their mayor is elected by the people and garbage is one of the issues raised by Filipinos. Los Banos has 14 ‘barangays’ or gardens. They started garbage separation and recycling about 10 years ago. When it was first launched in 2005 they received strong objection and rejection from the people. But today, keeping their environment clean is part of their culture.
The new elected Mayor Perez of Los Banos has come out with a 10-year Strategic Action Plan (2013-2023) which requires Los Banos Municipal to divert 50 per cent of the biodegradable waste and recyclables from going to the sanitary landfill in 2016.
In both cities, the people are required to bring out only biodegradable waste, which includes organic waste, from Monday to Friday for collection between 8pm and 9pm. The non-biodegradable must be taken out and sent to a designated collection centre only on every Saturday between 8pm and 9pm. Those found placing garbage outside their residence will be penalised by paying a 50 pesos (RM4.50) fine and their garbage will not be collected.
The organic waste collected are then sent for composting where they are put into a large shredding machine and then mixed with soil and night crawlers to turn into organic fertiliser within 10 days. This fertiliser is then used for their landscape plants while some are given free to farmers.
I also found recycling bins placed in strategic locations in the city of Tuguegarao where residents can place plastic bottles and cans, which we do not have in Ipoh. The flower pots in town are painted with creative words such as “Save the Earth. We have nowhere to Go”, “Cleanliness starts within yourself”, “Cleanliness is next to Godliness”, and “Be Clean in Thoughts, Words and Deeds”.
ICW has helped implement the Community Recycling Programmes involving 250 households in Jelapang Tambahan in collaboration with Perak SWCorp and Rukun Tetangga Jelapang. The project launched in April 2015 has produced positive results when more than 4 tonnes of garbage are saved from going to the landfill or illegal dumpsites with a recycling rate of 17 per cent, higher than the national average of 10 per cent.
The success has resulted in two more recycling programmes involving Buntong and Lim Garden residents. It will be launched on Saturday, September 19 at the Indian Recreational Club padang at 3.30pm by Dato’ Hajah Rusnah Kassim, Executive Councillor for Women’s Development, Family, Welfare, Caring Society, Housing and Local Government. All Ipohites are cordially invited to the function and learn about garbage separation and composting.
Ipoh was declared a city on May 27, 1988 with the Ipoh City Council or Majlis Bandaraya Ipoh (MBI) headed by a ‘Datuk Bandar’ or mayor administering an area size of 643 sq km and a population of about 720,000 people. It is divided into 23 zones each headed by an appointed councillor and assisted by two officers from MBI, who are normally residents of the zones. With the slogan ‘Ipoh Bersih Hijau dan Membangun’ it strives to make Ipoh a liveable city.
In April 2014, Ipoh was ranked by the US News as one of the nine best places to retire in the world. It declared Ipoh as the world’s third most affordable city after Vietnam and Thailand.
However, many Ipohites are also unhappy with the services rendered by MBI, especially those related to garbage, uncut grass and unclean drains. Residents fear the spread of dengue, as a result. Many have voiced their complaints through MBI’s hotline and Whatsapp while some brought their predicament to their respective councillors and the media.
Mayor Dato’ Harun Rawi recently announced that Ipoh City Council had received 6310 complaints from the public on various issues for the first quarter of this year. Of this 1263 complaints were on illegal dumpsites, farm wastes and dirty drains. The mayor too announced that 5179 or 82.4% of the complaints had been acted upon. On behalf of Ipoh City Watch, I wish to congratulate the mayor and MBI for having achieved their Key Performance Indicator (KPI) of minimum 80% set.
However, we are not sure if the 1629 illegal dumpsites identified at end 2014 have been reduced. This is not to say MBI has not taken action. Some of the problems lie with the perpetrators. MBI should also look into its KPI for enforcement to ensure that the perpetrators are caught and punished to deter others from doing the same.
Having a fixed schedule for garbage collection will help reduce the illegal dumpsites. The Council should also provide garbage bins to residents or enforce a ruling to have residents and business premises to provide their own. Rating by MBI and the health department on eateries should consider garbage disposal and separation of solid waste as criteria.
According to Solid Waste Corporation, each resident generates about 0.7kg solid waste per day. Thus the amount of solid waste generated by the 720,000 Ipohites is about 504,000kg. Based on the recycle rate of about 10%, about 453,600kg x 30 or 13,608 tonnes of solid waste produced each month will end up at illegal dumpsites or the only landfill in Ulu Johan.
Managing the disposal of solid waste by MBI is no easy task, as it involves technical, financial, institutional, economic and social constraints. Thus it is not surprising to see that the number illegal dumpsites will continue to rise until and unless the solid waste is managed properly and people start to change their perception on garbage separation and recycling.
Privatisation of solid waste looks imminent in Perak, one of the two states in the Northern region besides Penang, which has not accepted the terms and conditions stipulated in the agreement to have E-Idaman, the concession company appointed to manage solid waste in Perak. The concessionaire will be monitored by Perak SWCorp pursuant to the Solid Waste and Public Cleansing Management Act 2007 (Act 672) which was gazetted on August 30, 2007 and enforced on September 1, 2011.
Under the agreement, E-Idaman will take over the solid waste management responsibility from all 15 local councils in Perak. It includes the collection and disposal of garbage, grass cutting, cleaning of drains and providing garbage bins to all residents.
As President of Ipoh City Watch, I am urging the state government to hasten the negotiation process so that Ipohites and Perakeans can enjoy a cleaner and efficient disposal of solid waste.
I visited Langkawi two months ago to see how E-Idaman keeps the island clean. It was so different. I could hardly find any illegal dumpsites. Garbage bins were seen almost every 50m in the town centre. Local councils in Perak can continue playing other roles more effectively developing each area, reduce crime, improve transportation and business opportunity and increase employment rate. These are variables that make Melbourne the most liveable city in the world and Ipoh can achieve that status too in years to come.
Ipoh City Watch is developing a community recycling model involving 250 houses in Jelapang Tambahan with the cooperation of Rukun Tetangga Jelapang and assisted by Perak SWCorp. The project, which began in April, has produced very encouraging results. Some 1376kg or 12.3% garbage has been salvaged from landfill and illegal dumpsites within a period of nine weeks. The success of this model will be shared with other communities so that by 2020 we can help recycle at least 22% of the garbage nationwide.
Yesterday 15 March 2015 was a hectic day for us at Ipoh City Watch. In the morning we attended the World Peace Convention held in Ipoh for the first time. Then in the afternoon we have a fruitful meeting cum discussion on three major issues: Privatization of Solid Waste Management of Perak, Issues on Incinerator in Pangkor and 3R programs.
It was a closed door meeting with the Director of Perak Solid Waste Management and Public Cleansing Corp, Pn Hjh Fatimah Ahmad and activists AP Dr. Tan, Dr. Lai and Vincent Chung from iCycle Malaysia. It was a very insightful meeting.
The way forward now is to continue having our proactive discussion via our Whatsapp group to ensure that Perak is in the forefront in terms of managing Solid Waste and Recycling program. ICW will assist SW Corp and other stakeholders to Engage, Explain and Educate the public. Meanwhile, ICW will get more feedback from the public especially Perakians and Ipohites to find out about their thoughts on the impending privatization SWM project in Perak.
When you look at the American cities with the highest recycling rates, an interesting pattern emerges: They’re mostly on the West Coast. Maybe it’s the West’s environmentally conscious culture, or maybe it’s something in the water, but of the five cities we found doing the best jobs diverting their discards from local landfills, all were on the Pacific Coast—and all but one in California.
That’s not to say that cities elsewhere aren’t doing important work to reduce their waste streams. But when you map those cities that reduce, compost, or recycle more than 65 percent of their trash, that map is heavily weighted to the left.
Some of the reason for California’s dominance is that the state has been mandating tough waste diversion quotas for a long time. A California law passed in 1989 required cities and counties to cut their landfill shipments in half by 2000; another law passed in 2011 upped that to 75 percent by 2020. So it’s no surprise that California's cities are ahead of the rest of the United States when it comes to diverting trash from landfills. They have to be: It’s the law.
San Francisco: 80 percent
(Photo: Robert Galbraith/Reuters)
San Francisco is the undisputed queen of recycling cities in the country, with an 80 percent success rate at keeping discards out of landfills as of 2013. That’s partly because of the heightened environmental awareness among San Franciscans. It’s also because the City by the Bay has spent the last decade instituting sweeping—and strict—rules about how its residents and businesses can discard items they no longer want.
Take, for example, the city’s 2007 ban on disposable plastic bags—the first in the nation, and subsequently followed by other cities and soon the entire state of California. The ban prompted more use of reusable shopping bags, cutting down on the amount of litter reaching local landfills—and local beaches.
Two years later, San Francisco made recycling and composting mandatory: residents, businesses, and events face fines if they put recyclables or compostables like food waste in regular trash instead of the proper curbside bins.
Bans and laws have made a difference, said Guillermo Rodriguez, policy director for San Francisco’s Department of the Environment, but he said the real secret to San Francisco’s waste reduction success is more intangible. “People like to poke fun at ‘San Francisco Values,’ ” said Rodriguez, “but the reason our program is so successful is that reaching Zero Waste has really become one of the core values of San Francisco.”
Los Angeles: 76.4 percent
(Photo: Fred Prouser/Reuters)
Los Angeles diverted more than three-quarters of its waste from landfills in 2012, according to a study published that year by the Bureau of Sanitation and the University of California, Los Angeles. That rate has almost certainly climbed since. For one thing, L.A. started phasing in its much-heralded plastic bag ban at the beginning of this year, with even disposable paper bags subject to a 10-cent charge. For another, the city has set an aggressive waste reduction goal of 90 percent by 2025, with Zero Waste as an ultimate goal.
That may surprise people who’ve been following environmental news in Southern California for a while. Los Angeles has a long-standing reputation for exporting its solid waste to a network of landfills scattered across California—and it’s deserved: In 2011, Los Angeles sent its trash to 26 landfills, ranging from the Bay Area to San Diego. But Angelenos have been getting on the stick. From 2005 through 2011, the amount of trash thrown out per day by the average L.A. resident dropped from 5.9 pounds to 4.2 pounds.
Los Angeles’ waste reduction strategy dovetails with its climate change strategy: The city is aggressively pursuing a number of waste-to-energy projects in which materials that can’t be composted or recycled are turned into biofuels for transportation and power generation. Mainly involving anaerobic digestion, fermentation, and similar methods, these waste-to-energy techs are a lot cleaner than old-school, 1990’s-era incinerators and offer a more carbon-neutral source of energy.
San Jose: 75 percent
(Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
The San Francisco Bay Area’s largest city has long been a bit of a recycling dark horse, with no real reputation as an eco-sensitive hotbed: San Jose has had trash reduction rates above 60 percent for the better part of the last decade. According to city staff, San Jose has met a goal the city council set in 2007 to divert 75 percent of its trash from landfills, putting it at number three on our list.
One of the programs San Jose expects to implement on its way to meeting its Zero Waste goal, set for 2022, is a “Clean Recyclables Cart” campaign to reduce recyclables' contamination. Under the program, waste haulers will note residences with consistently missorted recyclables and compostables. City staff will assess the situation, contact residents with educational material available in English, Spanish, and Vietnamese, and offer further help if needed.
Since 2009, San Jose’s innovative Zero Waste Events program has cut trash generated at conventions, fairs, and other public events by 81 percent, not only keeping those red party cups out of landfills, but also performing a crucial public education service for event-goers. Both the public and event organizers have taken up the challenge, with one popular venue setting up refilling stations for water bottles as an alternative to single-serving disposable bottles.
Portland: 70 percent
(Photo: George Rose/Getty Images)
OK, make your jokes about artisan compost and locally sourced food waste. The fact is, Oregon’s largest city has a success rate of keeping waste out of landfills that a few less easily stereotyped burgs would do well to emulate. In 2012 Portland kept 70 percent of its discards out of area landfills, and the diversion rate for households was an impressive 74 percent.
That’s especially noteworthy given that Portland’s waste managers have to coordinate recycling and source reduction programs among the 40 independent private haulers that handle curbside pickup of both recyclables and trash.
Bruce Walker, solid waste and recycling program manager for Portland’s Bureau of Planning & Sustainability, said that enthusiastic cooperation between the city and all those private haulers has been crucial, and he’s optimistic that Portland will meet its 2015 goal of 75 percent diversion.
But even with that teamwork, said Walker, Portland might not be the recycling star it is without its motivated populace. “Public support is absolutely critical,” he said. “You can have all the cooperation in the world between haulers and agencies, you can have all the infrastructure in the world, but without a public that’s enthusiastic about recycling and composting, where would you be?”
Someplace other than Portland, the answer would seem to be.
San Diego: 68 Percent
(Photo: Education Images/Getty Images)
The West Coast’s southernmost big city is a respectable player in the waste diversion stats game: By 2012, San Diego was diverting 68 percent of its discards from landfills. City staff credit two factors for that high diversion rate—an aggressive construction and demolition debris recycling program, and a 2007 ordinance that requires almost everyone in San Diego to recycle. Only small businesses and apartment buildings generating less than four cubic yards of trash a week are exempted from the law—for now.
Those exemptions are likely to go away before long, as the city’s Environmental Services Department is in the process of crafting its Zero Waste plan, with a draft due in December. That plan will provide a roadmap for getting to the goals San Diego’s city council set in 2013 of 75 percent waste diversion by 2020, and Zero Waste by 2040.
Among San Diego’s most innovative initiatives is a large waste-composting program planned for the city’s popular “Miramar Greenery,” a composting facility on the site of the Miramar Landfill. So-called aerated static piles pump air into long composting windrows so that the material breaks down without anyone needing to turn the compost. That saves energy and expense, and similar systems can break wastes down into soil amendments in a month. San Diego expects to use the facility to process as much as 10,000 tons of green waste, and 20,000 tons of food waste, every year.
