Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Environment exec to tackle concerns with Mindanao mayors
ENVIRONMENT Secretary Angelo Reyes would be in Davao City for the convention of Mindanao's League of Municipalities at the Apo View Hotel Wednesday.
Department of Environment and Natural Resources director for Southern Mindanao Ricardo Calderon said Reyes will speak before the group and talk about environmental concerns, like solid waste management and environment protection among others.
Solid waste is an environmental problem that has reached critical proportions in the Philippines.
Due to a growing population, rapidly increasing consumption and increasing urbanization, waste generated in the Philippines is estimated at 19,700 tons per day. Projections show that waste generation will increase 47 percent by 2010, or 28,875 tons per day.
Solid waste management is the responsibility of local government units (LGUs).
There are 41,392 barangays, 1,502 municipalities, 116 cities and 77 provinces nationwide.
The barangay is responsible for the segregation of waste at source, collection of biodegradable, and recyclable components and setting up of a materials recovery facility (MRF). There are about 976 MRFs nationwide.
The municipality or city governments are responsible for the collection and disposal of residual non-biodegradable and hazardous waste, except in Metro Manila where disposal is within the mandate of the Metro Manila Development
Authority.
Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000 was signed into law in January 2000 to address the gargantuan solid waste problem of the Philippines. It espouses the reuse, recovery and recycling of MSW, with special emphasis on composting, as opposed to outright disposal.
The same act set February 2004 as the deadline for shifting from open to controlled dumping. By February 2006, the law states that controlled dumpsites will be deemed closed and phased out.
The law does not specify what type of disposal facility should be operated when the controlled dumpsites are phased out.
However, it contains minimum requirements for designing sanitary landfills as well as minimum considerations for its operation.
February 2004 has long passed but only about 126 LGUs had implemented the conversion of open dumps into controlled disposal facilities. There are still about 734 open dumpsites nationwide.
In contrast, there are only four sanitary landfills in the country (Clark Ecozone in Tarlac; Cebu City in the Visayas; Bais, Negros Oriental and Puerto Princesa City, Palawan).
About 215 sites have been identified as potential sanitary landfill.
At the current rate of implementation, LGUs' full compliance with the law is difficult to achieve.
Disregard for solid waste disposal regulations and laws, lack of political will, huge capital outlay requirements and insufficient funds, lengthy and bureaucratic processes, inadequate technical capacity, insufficient number or inappropriate collection vehicles, inability to reach households or collection stations and limited storage at transfer points are among the problems.
In addition, potential disposal sites are difficult to find due to public resistance to hosting facilities for storage, processing, treatment, and final disposal of wastes.
The failure of LGUs to close open dumps and establish the proper disposal facilities is now subject to lawsuits.
Since the establishment of dumps and landfills is costly, many LGUs are pushing for more composting and recycling activities. (BOT)
For Bisaya stories from Davao. Click here. (May 23, 2006 issue)
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