JakartaPost/Antara-Aug 29, 2024
Indonesia’s growing paper and plastic scrap imports may aggravate the country’s waste problems, experts say, calling on the government to develop recycling industries as well as waste management infrastructure. Indonesia is importing growing amounts of paper and plastic scrap but remains ill-prepared to process the material, which is aggravating the country’s already immense waste problem. Paper scrap imports rose by 6 percent to 3.24 million tons last year, while plastic scrap imports skyrocketed by 30 percent to 252,472 tons, Statistics Indonesia (BPS) data show. To deal with the incoming shipments in a sustainable way, industry players and experts have called on the government to develop recycling industries as well as waste management infrastructure. Saut Marpaung, chairman of the Indonesia Waste Entrepreneurs Association (APSI), said imported scrap always contained worthless residues that could not be processed.
The Environment and Forestry Ministry’s waste management director general, Rosa Vivien Ratnawati, said importers of nontoxic materials, including paper and plastic scraps, had to use all of the scraps as raw materials. She underlined that the scraps had to be homogenous, sorted, not derived from landfills and not mixed with other types of scraps. Alaika Rahmatullah, plastics audit coordinator at advocacy group Ecological Observation and Wetland Conservations (Ecoton), said 60 to 82 percent of Australian paper waste shipped to Indonesia was not recyclable as it was contaminated with flexible plastic scrap, plastic layers or plastic packaging and was therefore piling up at illegal dump sites in East Java and elsewhere. Australia, the European Union and the United States were the top three sources of waste, including paper and paperboard, shipped to Indonesia in 2023, according to World Integrated Trade Solution (WITS) data. Read more at: https://www.thejakartapost.com/business/2024/08/29/growing-paper-plastic-scrap-imports-aggravate-waste-problem.html.
