TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Thousands of Bogor City residents from the city's 13 sub-district came together to clean up the Ciliwung River for Ciliwung's Trash-Picking Competition, which was organised by Bogor's City Administration and the Ciliwung Cares Community (KPC) on Saturday, May 28, 2016.
The event, which began at 05.30, Western Indonesia Time (WIB), was officially launched by Bogor's Mayor Bima Arya Sugiarto at Bogor's City Hall, where immediately afterwards, participants, along with volunteers went to sections of the river that passes through their sub-districts, until the deadline - which was set at 13:30 (WIB) - arrives.
"This is the eighth competition that we've organised, and we intentionally organised it to coincide with Bogor's 534th Anniversary," said one of the coordinators for the competition, Mutiara. "That said, this is the first competition that has the backing of the city's administration - as it fits in with the Mayor's 'Clean-up Our Bogor' Program, which had only just been inaugurated by the Administration earlier in 2016."
Mutiara added that although the nature and the spirit of the competition remains the same, several notable differences could be seen - especially in terms of scoring. This year, the scoring is not only based on the number of participants that each participating sub-district managed to involve, but also the volume of trash that each sub-district manages to pick out from the river.
Other scoring criteria have also been included in this year's competition. "It's not just a matter of picking out the most rubbish out of the river, but we will also be judging the way each participating sub-districts sort out the rubbish that they took out," said Mutiara. "The winner is the sub-district that manages to pile the most amount of trash, and sort them out properly."
After the deadline had passed, the accumulated garbage were then taken by volunteers and coordinators to be weighed and judged - in accordance to the scoring criteria that they have set. "For four years in a row, the sub-district of Tanah Sareal have won the competition," said Mutiara. "Hopefully, the new scoring criteria - which incorporates creativity as well as awareness - could push other sub-districts to do better, and steal the Mayor's trophy from Tanah Sareal."
One of the judges for the competition, F.S Putri Cantika from Bogor's Institute for Agriculture's (IPB), Regional Zoning and Development Centre, said that the competition does not only aim to clear out the river from garbage obstruction - as researchers could gather a lot of valuable information by analysing the type of rubbish that pollutes the Ciliwung River.
"For years, we have minimal data about the kinds of flotsam and jetsam that pollutes the river,' said Putri. "This time around, we are capitalising on the opportunity to gather important information that could give us a clue about the origins of the garbage - for example, is it waste from garment factories upstream of the river, or whether it originates from households that dot the river's banks."
"These sort of information is helpful because it would help us to create a recommendation for the Administration about the sort of actions that they could take to help tackle the issue of Ciliwung's pollution," continued Putri.
The Head of KPC, Een Irawan Putra, said that he hopes the competition will bring about more awareness among the general public about the importance of keeping the Ciliwung River clean. "After eight annual competition, we can see that the public is becoming more aware of the issue, and in the future, we want all residents - not just residents who lives by the course of the river - to have the same level of awareness," he said.
ANTARA
