Why PH is world’s 3rd biggest dumper of plastics in the ocean?

By Pia Ranada

Irresponsible garbage hauling companies and the presence of open dump sites near rivers are two reasons
why the Philippines is among the world's top ocean polluters, according to a new study.

MANILA, Philippines – The Philippines has among the highest trash collection rates in Southeast Asia yet
it's the world's 3rd biggest source of plastic leaking into the ocean.

A new report on plastic pollution by international group Ocean Conservancy and McKinsey Center for
Business and Environment looks into this alarming discrepancy.

The study, released to media on October 1, looked at 5 of the world’s biggest contributors of plastic
pollution in the world’s oceans.

China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam contribute over half of all plastics that end up in
the seas, according to the study. (INFOGRAPHIC: Plastic in our seas: Why you should care)

What do these 5 countries have in common? They are all benefiting from economic growth, reduced
poverty, and improved quality of life.

But this new-found economic power has led to “exploding demand for consumer products that has not
yet been met with a commensurate waste-management infrastructure,” reads the report.

The Philippines was ranked the 3rd top source of plastic leaking into oceans in a February 2015 study. The
country generates 2.7 million metric tons of plastic garbage each year, 20% or 521,000 tons of which ends
up in the ocean.

Yet the country reported one of the highest garbage collection rates in the region – with a national average
of 85% and nearly 90% in some dense urban areas.

So why the discrepancy?

Irresponsible trash haulers

The study found that 74% of the plastics leaking into the ocean from the Philippines comes from garbage
that has already been collected by haulers and garbage trucks. This amounts to 386,000 tons of plastic
trash.

Only 26% or 135,000 tons of plastics in seas actually comes from garbage that is not collected.

The study attributed the leakage of collected garbage to two factors: illegal dumping by garbage-hauling
companies, and open dump sites located near waterways.

Based on interviews with local government officials and environmental groups, the study found that waste
leakage in the Philippines often happens while the garbage is transported from the collection site
(households, village material recovery facilities) to the dump sites.
Some private garbage hauling companies unload their trucks on their way to disposal sites in order to cut
costs.

“Waste is usually dumped at the roadside, at informal deposit sites, or directly into waterways in locations
where it is convenient to do so,” reads the report.

This saves the haulers time and money. The reduced garbage load can even reduce fuel consumption.

Open dump sites

The second major source of leaked garbage after collection are open dump sites which are typically near
waterways.

The fact that the Philippines is an archipelagic country and with an elaborate network of rivers does not
help matters, says the study.

The study specifically names as an example the open dump of Dagupan City in Pangasinan which is located
right on the coastline.

The decision by local governments to put dump sites near waterways is often due to financial
considerations.

“Land adjacent to rivers tends to be cheaper than in other parts of the country, and waste will
intermittently be carried away by heavy rains or currents, refreshing the capacity of the dump site to
receive more waste,” reads the study.

Open dump sites are illegal in the country under the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000. But
there are still around 600 of them in the country. Sanitary landfills, the only type of disposal site allowed
by the law, number only around 70.

Sanitary landfills are a type of disposal site in which garbage is isolated from the environment, usually by
being buried in a large hole lined with thick plastic or a layer of clay. It also often involves a network of
pipes to prevent liquids generated by the garbage from leaking into the ground.

But sanitary landfills are costly to construct. Local governments in the Philippines often lack either political
will or the budget to construct such facilities.

“Waste management is technical and very expensive. We have no land, no money, and a sanitary landfill
is hard to run,” Dagupan City mayor Belen Fernandez to Rappler.

The National Solid Waste Management Commission, the agency tasked with overseeing waste
management in the country, also lacks funding.

“All we can do is remind all mayors to close open dump sites. Then if they don’t comply, we tell the
Ombudsman,” said the agency’s executive director, Eli Ildefonso.

Plugging the leaks

So how can the Philippines plug these two sources of plastic leaks?
To fix the first problem, illegal dumping by waste haulers, the Philippines should first make the process of
procuring garbage hauling services more transparent.

In many cases, contracts are distributed at the sole discretion of local government officials, leaving room
for corruption.

A more transparent procurement process “fosters competition between bidders and is based upon clearly
laid-out performance criteria.”

Such a system should penalize illegal practices by the haulers through dumping fines or even cancellation
of contracts. The haulers can be monitored carefully through GPS tracking of garbage trucks to ensure the
trucks complete their designated route with their full load of waste.

To reduce leaks from open dump sites, the study still recommends full closure or physical sealing of open
dump sites near waterways and the establishment of more sanitary landfills.

But given the cost and difficulty posed by these solutions, the study also suggests simpler, faster and
cheaper solutions for the short term.

These include creating a perimeter around the dump and its access road to help limit the size of the dump.
The perimeter can be made of old tired, concrete rubble, or even discarded appliances.

Using a bulldozer, excavator, or front-end loader, garbage can also be compacted and periodically covered
with soil to form layers that will not easily escape into waterways.

Such equipment, along with one or more dump trucks, basic fencing, and a small guard house or office
can be procured for $300,000 to 500,000 (P14 million to 23 million) per dump site, depending on the size
of the dump.

Just addressing the two major sources of plastic leaks could reduce the country’s total leakage by 26%.

https://www.rappler.com/science-nature/environment/108276-philippines-plastic-pollution-ocean-
conservancy-study
Philippines is the 3rd worst contributor to plastic pollution in the ocean

By Coconuts Manila Feb. 16, 2015

This is not a list you want to top. In 2010, “between 4.8 and 12.7 million tons of plastic entered
the oceans — the median of those estimates is 1.3 times the weight of the Great Pyramid at Giza,” reports
Tim McDonell on motherjones.com. That’s from a new study published by Science.

According to the study, the Philippines placed third with a little over 1 billion pounds of plastic
dumped in the ocean in 2010. China topped the study, dumping nearly 5 billion pounds of plastic in the
ocean. Indonesia, which dumped nearly 2 million pounds of plastic is the second worst offender. Check
out the chart, also published by Motherjones.com, below:

The study, which was led by University of Georgia environmental engineer Jenna Jambeck, “set out to
calculate how much plastic the world’s 192 coastal countries dumps in the ocean. They combined data on
each country’s per-capita waste generation, the size of the population living within 50 kilometers of the
ocean, the percentage of waste that is plastic, and the percentage of plastic waste that is “mismanaged.”
The editorial continues: “Even naming the Philippines as the number three plastics polluter is somewhat
of a farce. The pollution data is based on the amount of plastic products produced in a country and then
an arbitrary percentage is assigned as to how much of that plastic might-note the word ‘might’- find its
way into the oceans. The list of “polluters” was based on the number of people living within 50 miles of
an ocean coastline therefore assuming that these people dump their plastics in the sea.

“Guess which large nation has the greatest ‘Coastline to land area ratio’ on the planet–the Philippines.
And Indonesia and PHL rank number 1 and 2 respectively for having the longest coastlines not facing the
Arctic region like Russia and Canada.”

This raises a thoughtful point, indeed. But while Business Mirror thinks that “scare tactics like this based
on faulty analysis serve no purpose to motivate and mobilize public action,” we think it’s always a good
time to start cleaning up our act.

https://coconuts.co/manila/news/philippines-3rd-worst-contributor-plastic-pollution-ocean/
PHL 3rd in list of countries with the most ocean plastic pollution
Published February 13, 2015 8:03am
by WILL DUNHAM, Reuters

WASHINGTON - The world's oceans are clogged with plastic debris, but how much of it finds its way into
the seas annually? Enough to place the equivalent of five grocery bags full of plastic trash on every foot
(30 cm) of every nation's coastline around the globe.

That's according to scientists who released research on Thursday estimating that a staggering 8 million
metric tones of plastic pollution enter the oceans each year from the world's 192 coastal countries based
on 2010 data.

China was responsible for the most ocean plastic pollution per year with an estimated 2.4 million tons,
about 30 percent of the global total, followed by Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Thailand,
Egypt, Malaysia, Nigeria and Bangladesh.

Based on rising waste levels, they estimated that more than 9 million tons would end up in the oceans in
2015.

The trash encompasses just about anything imaginable made of plastic including shopping bags, bottles,
toys, food wrappers, fishing gear, cigarette filters, sunglasses, buckets and toilet seats.

"In short, you name it and it is probably somewhere in the marine environment," said Kara Lavender Law,
a research professor of oceanography with the Massachusetts-based Sea Education Association.

The estimates were based on information including World Bank data for trash generated per person in
all nations with a coastline, coastal population density, the amount of plastic waste countries produce and
the quality of their waste-management practices.

"I think this is a wake-up call for how much waste we produce," said University of Georgia environmental
engineering professor Jenna Jambeck.

The researchers calculated that 275 million tons of plastic waste was generated in the 192 coastal
countries that year, with an estimated 8 million tons entering the ocean and a possible range between 4.8
million and 12.7 million

"The most pressing need is to capture plastic waste to prevent it from entering the environment," Law
said. "This means investing in waste management infrastructure, especially in those countries with rapidly
developing economies."

"In high-income countries, we also have a responsibility to reduce the amount of waste, especially plastic
waste, that we produce," she added.

The research was published in the journal Science. —Reuters

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