Posted inArticle /

Despite of green city label, Langsa fails to manage 70 percent of its waste

Langsa, Ekuatorial – Lacking of garbage trucks to transport waste had resulted to piles of domestic waste up till Monday (30/3), said an official, in Langsa.

Hermin Nuzul, chief of Langsa Hygiene and Sanitation agency, said that only 30 percent of the city’s waste can be transported and managed to the landfill every day while the remaining 70 percent was either piled up in people’s houses or being burned down.

“Residents are still throwing their garbage outside trash cans as a result of lack of bins. So, their waste piled up in the road,” said Nuzul.

Idris Yusuf, resident of Blang Pase, said that piled waste can be seen everywhere as officers did not pick them up. and people were spotted burning their own waste.

“If they did not come for several days, I usually burn them,” he said criticizing the award for green city from central government to Langsa for its 2012-17 Medium Term National Planning was inappropriate.

“How does environment can be healthy if we can see piles of garbage and lots of people burning waste as they want,” he said.

Based on Langsa Environment and Park agency, the city produces 419.53 cubic meter of waste per day with 90 percent of that is coming from household.

Out of that number, only 146 cubic meters, or 30 percent, can be transported and managed at the landfill, leaving the remaining 70 percent left scattered in the streets.

Other obstacle, Nuzul said that only 16 garbage trucks operating for the city. In addition, lack of temporary landfills.

He added that they have already proposed budget to buy more trucks and other facilities but rejected by Langsa House of Representatives.

However, Saifullah, member of Commission D of Langsa House of Representatives, slammed the statement saying that they had invited the agency to discuss on the matter but never showed up.

“When we discussed budget [on hygiene and sanitation], only his secretary came [to the Langsa House of Representatives],” said Saifullah. “There’s lack of garbage trucks and trash bins but they were never proposed any budget. It’s possible internal lack of coordination resulted to missed being proposed.”

Another lawmaker from Aceh Party, Zulfian said the House never cut any proposals especially the Hygiene and Sanitation Agency.

“Compare to other agencies, the Hygiene and Sanitation agency received biggest funding and it was never cut because we support Langsa mayor’s program,” he said adding that allocated budget for the agency reached Rp16 billion (US$ 1.2 million) for 2015. Ivo Lestari

There are no comments yet. Leave a comment!

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.