Garbage ping!

A ping sends a packet of information from one device to another over a network and measures how long it takes to receive the response from the other device. That is what the internet says. There are, undoubtedly, many pings coming from jarring issues that can be subject of any written exposition. For instance, we can hear more notable pings from the ongoing war between Iran on one hand and the combined US-Israel forces on the other hand. But, whether it escalates or dies down is something out of our hand. That is as an international topic as can be. No writing that we do however, can affect their enmity. Then, on the national scene, there is this ping on the impeachment of Vice President Sara Duterte-Carpio, which can be exciting to comment on but, let us better leave that to our legislators to wrack their heads about.

There is also a ping on an important concern we Cebuanos need to dwell on. This is the disposal of our city garbage. We long had this problem. Our former leaders of decades ago thought that the Inayawan garbage dumping site was a lifelong solution until the increasing demands of environment revealed how inadequate and unhealthy it really was. So it was natural for our leaders to accept the Binaliw landfill as a viable solution until the mountainous garbage deposit slid and killed many.

Today, we hear our honorable Cebu City Mayor Nestor D. Archival trying different options. Waste disposal is a main concern of an acknowledged environmentalist like our mayor, from his almost daily reportage, he constantly explains to us that the city’s refuse is about seven hundred tons but the reported landfill in Consolacion, the availability of which successfully negotiated, is only ready to accept about one hundred tons. Even the Aloguinsan dumping site, which is quite far from the city, cannot absorb the remainder. Mayor Archival’s exhortation that we segregate our garbage before calling our Department of Public Service personnel to collect is reasonable and it needs our cooperation. Still these are temporary.

Many years ago, then Mayor Ronald Duterte foresaw this huge problem. He knew that the Inayawan dumpsite could not absorb the city’s garbage for long. After citing verifiable health data, he spoke with deep apprehension. Sooner than later, he said, there would be no more space for our refuse to deposit. So, he suggested that the city should establish its own rather modern landfill. The area bounded by Barangays Guadalupe, Kalunasan, Busay and Lahug was the location he cited. Admittedly, it would have sat right at the center of the city’s north and south districts. According to Mayor Ronald, if operational economics were to be considered, there would be no better location. True indeed, garbage trucks would only have a shorter distance to negotiate, and turn around would have been quicker. Unfortunately, he was unseated before he could materialize his dream. Until now, nobody has picked up that idea.

Perhaps, the disaster in Binaliw should be taken as a silver lining of sort. While the government should not stop investigating why it happened and prevent a recurrence, a more vigorous effort should focus on finding a place where to throw our garbage eventually. That is a most serious problem at hand. To me, instead of looking beyond the city’s boundaries for places where we would bring our waste, why does not the present administration try to revisit the idea of Mayor Duterte. There are better technologies to determine whether it might be a viable project. If viable, it can be worked on in a faster speed because the necessity is urgent.