DENPASAR ~

Head of Ecoregion Management (PPE) Bali-Nusa Tenggara of Ministry of Environment and Forestry Novrizal Tahar said that the landfills capacity (TPA) on the island approaching the capacity of the land that is provided.

“To overcome this problem, the government and relevant agencies should conduct a breakthrough and the optimal solution dealing with the waste,” he said in Denpasar, on Saturday.

“All citizens have the same behavior in throwing the trash. But developed countries usually apply more firm sanctions, so that people is forced to follow the rules. But over time they became regularly throwing trash to the right place,” he said.

Novrizal cited earlier Singaporean had the same behavior that the people throw garbage randomly. But it changes thanks to the firmness of the government to maintain the cleanliness of the country.

“Because of the relatively high financial penalties given against violators, the people in Singapore slowly began to orderly dispose the waste. Start from sorting in the household, between organic and non-organic,” he said.

He said that this behavior should be emulated by Indonesian people not to throw garbage randomly, due to the fact that the piles of garbage in the landfill and downstream are increasing.

“Currently the landfill officers have difficulties to sort the garbage, so the garbage piles up. We can see in the landfill Suwung, Denpasar. The pile of trash already very high,” he said.

This condition, he said, would affect the surrounding environment.

“Hygienic behavior by disposing waste in place and has been divided since inside the house will make it easier to be managed by the landfill officers in the next process. If people understand the economic value of garbage, then I am sure in the future the existence of the waste will not be in high pile,” he said.

Therefore, he advised the government to seek a breakthrough in overcoming the garbage, such as providing incentives to the public who can collect waste in accordance with the rules.

“Currently, there are many waste banks. People can sell their waste in that bank to get the incentive. That is what I see in Makassar. The people there already implement the garbage bank system. The advantage for the society is having their saving for depositing trash that has been sorted, “he said.