Landfill starts segregation policy

CEBU, Philippines - Nineteen garbage trucks from 15 barangays, two from the Department of Public Services and one from a private company were not allowed to enter the Inayawan Sanitary Landfill yesterday for violating the “no segregation, no collection” policy that came into effect yesterday.

The barangays which, ignored the instructions from the city government to segregate their garbage, were Basak-San Nicolas, Mambaling, Tisa, Bulacao, Bacayan, Pahina-San Nicolas, Apas, Talamban, Sawang Calero, Labangon, Quiot, Suba, Guadalupe, Calamba and Banilad. Trucks from the DPS and a certain Man Tech, a private company that was able to secure a permit to dump at the landfill, also came with unsorted trash.

These trucks were not allowed to enter the landfill because they collected a combination of biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste while the schedule of collection for yesterday was supposedly for biodegradable waste only.

Some of the trucks were, however, able to go back and deposit their load after they complied with the policy.

At the Inayawan landfill, a portion was set aside where trucks could dump the waste which is then hauled to the processing area.

At the processing area, the trash is fed into three shredder machines for biodegradable waste manned by at least 20 people, who are former scavengers in the landfill.

Councilor Nida Cabrera, chairwoman of council committee on environment, said that they initially hired 20 people for the pilot operation, who will receive a minimum daily salary that will be released every end of the month.

They will operate the shedder machines, the bioreactors and the carbonizer.

There will be a total of 12 shredders, six for biodegradable waste and six for non-biodegradable waste, five bioreactors and one carbonizer. These comprise the three sets of waste processing facilities leased by the city government at P1.2 million a month.

Randy Navarro, chief of the landfill operations said that they expect the city to save from the P100 million annual maintenance of the landfill in the past because they will only have to spend less than P2 million a month to operate the waste processing facility.

The machines will run for 16 hours a day and are capable of processing over a hundred tons each of biodegradable waste and non-biodegradable waste.

Compared to the more than 400 tons of garbage generated and dumped at the landfill daily before April 1, Navarro said that the volume of garbage is expected to decrease because many barangays have started recycling in their own Material Recovery Facilities.

In fact yesterday, only about 10 tons of biodegradable waste, which is usually about 240 tons daily, was collected and processed at the landfill.

The landfill will still be open 24 hours. There are two inspectors per shift tasked by the DPS to inspect the trucks entering the perimeter. Another two DPS personnel are designated as guides.

Navarro said many barangays obeyed the new policy but Cabrera said her Cebu City Environmental Sanitation and Enforcement Team apprehended thousands of violators who were given a one-time amnesty since they have just started with the implementation.

Apprehended violators of the City Ordinance 2031 were educated and informed of the new policy. Until today, the CESET, the Barangay Environment Officers including tanods are roaming the city to spread the word about the full implementation of the ordinance.

Meanwhile, over a hundred scavengers had nothing to do as they had no biodegradable waste to sift through. They complained they had nothing to sell to buy food for their families. 

Mary Ann Campo, Gigi Cortes, Doris Garcia and Mary Jane Tubilla are housewives at the same time scavengers. All have children attending elementary and high school.

They said they hope that the city government will help them find another source of income or they will propose to bring back the old ways because they are willing to do the segregation themselves.

Navarro said that their proposal needs a study at the city council.

But so far, he said, everything is going smoothly while they expect that people will be able to fully adjust to the new system in two to three weeks. —/BRP (FREEMAN)