Encouraged by the recent encyclical letter of Pope Francis, the Ecowaste Coalition on Saturday asked the government to review the present system to put an end to garbage dumping in the Philippines.
The group said authorities need to take a long and hard look at the current regulations, procedures and controls to tackle the unethical and unlawful waste dumping from overseas, saying it is clearly an affront to the national dignity and a violation of national and international laws.
The appeal came on the heels of the waste analysis and characterization study (WACS) conducted by the government on a few of the 48 unclaimed container vans of imported plastic scraps from Canada now left abandoned at the Subic Port.
The 48 container vans consigned to Live Green Enterprise arrived with no prior importation clearance from the Environmental Management Bureau in four batches between December 2013 and January 2014.
The shipments are separate from the 50 container vans that arrived in separate dates in July and August 2013. The shipper—Chronic Inc.—based at 95 Regency Crescent Whtby, Ontario, Canada—declared the shipment in its import document as plastic scraps.
But examiners inspected the container vans and discovered the vans containing more than 891,000 kilos of heterogeneous scrap plastic materials that authorities claimed to be hazardous waste.
“As we eagerly await the detailed WACS results, we appeal to the government to initiate a participatory process that will look at the gaps, loopholes and weaknesses of the system that is allowing garbage smuggling to ensue,” said Aileen Lucero, Ecowaste Coalition coordinator.
The group said Pope Francis explained that “because the enforcement of laws is at times inadequate due to corruption, public pressure has to be exerted in order to bring about decisive political action.”
“Society, through non-governmental organizations and intermediate groups, must put pressure on governments to develop more rigorous regulations, procedures and controls… to control damage to the environment,” the group quoted the pope as saying.
The environmental coalition urged the government, particularly the Bureau of Customs and the Environmental Management Bureau, to consider the following recommendations:
• Conduct a public consultation to review current laws and regulations pertaining to the trade of “waste commodities” with the goal of tightening the rules to thwart the entry, dumping and disposal of prohibited waste materials.
• Publicly make available through the BoC and EMB websites all importations categorized as “waste,” particularly “plastic waste” and “electronic waste.”
• Prohibit the unloading from vessels of waste shipments with no prior importation clearance and to direct for their immediate return to the port of origin.
• Disapprove the disposal of illegal waste imports in local landfills and other disposal facilities.