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Friday, March 18, 2005
Heroes of the environment
By Earnest Hope L. Tinambacan
PEOPLE downgrade them for their job.
They work amid trash and dirt and decomposing garbage.
They literally live in a stinky, foul-smelling, and dirty world. And they practically live off the jetsam and flotsam of civilization.
Their activity may be demeaning to many people, but the urban environment would be unthinkable without them.
Most people say poor people are poor because they are lazy and undisciplined. So much for stereotyping.
City sweepers
Indeed, these poor people are poor.
But they wake up as early at three o'clock in the morning daily to pick and clean up the mess of other people.
In comparison, most students hate waking up early to attend their seven o'clock morning class.
An hour later, these heroes and heroines in yellow shirt pan out in the cold dawn through the streets of Dumaguete City, its boulevard, and park armed with nothing but brooms and dustpans.
They have to be there before early morning joggers and vehicular traffic fill up. They take a break four to five hours later.
By then, yesterday's litters are gone.
At one o'clock in the afternoon, they are back and sweat-soaked they continue with their 'business' until three o'clock to complete a seven-hour workday.
On Sundays, these yellow army work for only five hours.
Dumaguete City has an army of 30 sweepers, 17 of whom are street sweepers.
The rest do the boulevard and the park.
"Without these sweepers, cleanliness would not be maintained...it is just right to recognize their contribution to the city," Godofredo Rendora, acting head of the city's general services office, acknowledged.
Dumpsite scavengers
At the city's dumpsite, aesthetically renamed City Dumpsite and Ecological Park, in Barangay Candau-ay, Dumaguete City, more than 80 scavengers sift through decayed and decaying wastes for whatever reusable items they can forage that can be recycled and sold to junk merchants.
The dumpsite and park office had since organized the scavengers into the Balugo and Candau-ay Scavengers Association, Incorporated.
The association exclusively collect plastics in the dumpsite and sell them to private buyers at one peso per kilogram and two pesos per kilogram for white plastic bags like those used in Lee Plaza or Cang's.
"They are not totally under our office but we started organizing them so that they could also help the city in environmental protection and make money at the same time," said Engineer Rogelio Clamonte, head of the City's Environment Office.
Discarded and, later, collected plastics are sold and end in Manila for recycling.
Some buyers in Dumaguete City recycle and mould the plastics into handles, sandals, and house decorations.
They are health hazards especially when burned.
"The dioxin in plastics could cause cancer when inhaled or when it enters the body. And also, when not properly disposed, plastics could contribute to the drainage problem and cause water pollution for they are non-biodegradable materials," explained Clamonte.
The scavengers also collect fruit juice foil packs that they sell to the Calindagan Multi-purpose Cooperative at P0.10 each.
The cooperative recycle the waste packs into funky, durable and waterproof bags.
Clamonte said the problem on plastics has become manageable because they are saleable.
"What we ask from the public is proper waste disposal and the support for the re-using and recycling campaign," he added.
(March 17, 2005 issue)
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