Clean Indonesia Movement Launched to Reduce Plastic Waste

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan accompanied by Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi and legendary Singer Titik Puspa, launched a Clean Indonesian Movement on Sunday, to reduce plastic waste.

"The Clean Indonesian Movement is our common movement. Waste is our common enemy. Hence, it is our common responsibility to maintain Indonesia clean. Moreover, the waste treatment program has become a crucial government program that should be carried out by everybody," Pandjaitan said.

Jakarta produces at least eight thousand tons of plastic waste daily.

He called on the public to stop using single-use plastic products.

Environmental lesson will be included in school curricula for elementary, junior and senior high school students, he remarked.

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Meanwhile, Minister Sumadi said he would coordinate plastic reduction program in the land, marine and air transportation sectors including in trains. He also said that sea is not a trash bin so therefore one must never throw waste into seas.

As an oil producing nation, Indonesia has manufactured various types of goods made of plastics, whose basic ingredient is crude petroleum.

Despite several benefits that plastics have offered and made life easier, plastic use has environmental consequences, such as land and marine pollution due to plastic waste and deaths of wildlife after ingesting plastics or becoming entangled in plastic trash.

Plastic has toxic pollutants that harm the environment and cause land, water, and air pollution. It can take hundreds or also thousands of years for plastic to break down, so damage to the environment is long-lasting.

ANTARA