MANILA — The government is seeking further multisectoral action for zero waste in the country, which the National Solid Waste Management Commission (NSWMC) said generates over 10 million tons of waste annually.
Zero waste is “an advocacy that promotes designing and managing of products and processes to avoid and eliminate volume and toxicity of waste and materials,” noted NSWMC.
NSWMC is a body, which the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) chairs.
“Saving the environment is most effective if all sectors of society work as a team,” DENR Secretary Roy Cimatu said Thursday (Jan. 25) at the 2018 Zero Waste Month celebration and 4th Eco-Waste Management Summit in Metro Manila.
Cimatu raised the urgency for action, saying solid waste poses harm to people and the environment.
Such harm, the secretary pointed out, included environmental pollution and illnesses due to unsanitary conditions in solid waste-littered areas.
Republic Act 9003, known as the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act, states that solid waste refers to “all discarded household, commercial waste, non-hazardous institutional and industrial waste, street sweepings, construction debris, agricultural waste, and other non-hazardous/non-toxic solid waste.”
RA 9003 further reads: “Solid waste management shall refer to the discipline associated with the control of generation, storage, collection, transfer and transport, processing, and disposal of solid wastes in a manner that is in accord with the best principles of public health, economics, engineering, conservation, aesthetics, and other environmental considerations, and that is also responsive to public attitudes.”
This year’s Zero Waste Month celebration and the eco-waste summit aimed to highlight the need to sustain all sectors’ shared responsibilities on solid waste and SWM.
Proclamation 760 series of 2014 declared January of every year as Zero Waste Month.
NSWMC and DENR continue promoting solid waste management nationwide, as well as reducing, recycling, and reusing materials.
The agencies note that the Philippines generates an estimated 36 tons of waste daily.
Metro Manila was the country’s top waste-generating region and produces nearly 8,300 tons of waste per day or about three million tons of waste per year, NSWMC said.
Earlier, DENR reported registering a 138-percent accomplishment in its 2017 nationwide solid waste management campaign.
DENR said such accomplishment was the agency’s highest then, realized by strictly implementing RA 9003.
The department said its accomplishments included assistance to 321 LGUs in properly closing and rehabilitating open and controlled dumpsites within water quality management areas and the Manila Bay region. (Catherine Teves/PNA)
