Keeping Metro Manila and Phl municipalities clean

Every student should know that everyday, at their schools, hundreds of pieces of papers are used. Unless they already have a recycling center, all that paper will get thrown away. Moreover, school cafeterias probably provide over 1,000 plastic or paper cups for beverages everyday. That’s an awful lot of plastic or paper! Are they thrown away or recycled? Cafeterias often use food supplies that come in very large tin or plastic containers. These can be recycled.

If you have not yet started an environmental science class project, prepare the following: several large, sturdy cardboard boxes or bins to collect glass, metal and paper. Label each. Do not leave the boxes out where they can get wet. Choose a place to put recycled materials for easy hauling of the Linis Ganda buyers.

Here’s the estimated selling price list of lumang diyaryo, bote, bakal at baterya (old newspapers, bottles, metals and batteries) from a local junk shop.

Bubog or crushed glass bottles from imported liquor, medicine or cosmetic bottles, including drinking glasses, are priced at P1 per kilo, if the bubog is colored, it is half-priced.

Cartons, paper and old newspapers – used cartons – P2.50 per kilo, old newspapers - P4 per kilo, white paper - P8 per kilo.

Lata (tin), tansan (bottle caps), and food cans - P3 per kilo.

Plastics – sibakin or hard plastic - P10 per kilo, white plastic bags - P5 per kilo, and PVC pipes - P3 per kilo.

Assorted metals – “tapalodo” (car fender) - P7-8 per kilo, hard aluminum - P35 per kilo, aluminum jalousie - P45 per kilo, red copper - P300 per kilo, yellow copper - P250 per kilo (now you see why aluminum wires are stolen), aluminum pots – P60 per kilo, stainless steel pots – P20 per kilo.

Bottles – soy sauce, ketchup, vinegar, Nescafe bottles – P1.50 per small, P2 per large bottle, softdrink bottles – P2 per piece. How about that?

Alcoholic drink and medicine bottles and gallons – long neck and whiskey bottles – P1.50 per piece, large Gilbey’s bottle – P0.75 per piece, beer – P1 per piece, Grande – P2 per piece, garapa – P0.50 per piece, one plastic gallon - P14-16 per piece, plastic bottle – P12 per kilo.

Car batteries of cars, trucks, motorcycles, etc. is P150-400 per piece

Electronic wastes – diskettes – P8 per kilo, ink cartridges – P100-300 per kilo, motherboards, telecom cards - P65 per kilo, old CPU complete unit – P110 per unit

Make it work

Once you have the school recycling center set up, be sure to let everyone know about it. Make posters announcing the center. It could be a great project for the art class. An announcement could be sent out to local newspapers, radio and TV stations. You might even find your school on TV! Then, you can hold a friendly contest between schools in your district to see who can recycle the most or have the most fun doing it!

Teach your parents well about the depletion of the earth’s resources

Even though they sometimes pretend not to, your parents really care about what you think. Now, here is your chance to teach them some important things they may not know. When your parents were kids, hardly anyone ever worried about saving the environment. That is because they did not know it was in trouble. They developed some bad habits. They made as much garbage as they wanted, using up the earth’s treasures just for fun.

The earth’s treasures are made up of the various energy resources used up for making aluminum, bottles or plastic containers. For example, the energy saved from recycling one aluminum can, could keep your TV running for three hours! The energy saved from recycling one glass bottle will light a 100-watt light bulb for four hours. Light bulbs, windows, TVs, mirrors, we throw most of our glass away. The Earth Works group states that America tosses enough glass bottles and jars to fill up a giant skyscraper. Over half of the plastic we buy and throw away each year is just packaging. When you buy something packaged in plastic or cardboard, you are actually buying and paying for that thing plus garbage.

One third of all garbage is packaging

It sounds ridiculous doesn’t it? But that is what happens. You tear off the packaging and stuff it right in the garbage! If that is plastic packaging, it is made from one of the earth’s greatest buried treasures – oil. It has been underground for millions of years! If we turn oil into plastic, we can never change it back. It can never be part of the earth again. There are about 315 million Americans while there are today, approximately 105 million Filipinos. According to the Earth Works group, Americans use more than 5 million plastic bottles every hour. And most of them get thrown away.

If we draw a comparison, perhaps Filipinos use about 1 million glass, aluminum or plastic bottles by drinking softdrinks everyday, but at least, we are usually conditioned to recycle our glass bottles.

Thus, when we talk about how our garbage dumps are filling up, one-third of all that garbage is packaging. Less packaging means less garbage. “Precycling” is the answer, that is, buying things which come in packages that can be recycled, not turned into garbage or are made of materials that have already been recycled. For example, buy eggs in cardboard, not Styrofoam cartons. You may reuse the cartons for art projects. Buy cereals or cookies in boxes made of recycled cardboard. Recycled cardboard is grey on the inside.

For mayors’ wives, perhaps the Clean and Green Movement could be balanced with a touch of class or be associated with a housewife’s work at home. Since our society attaches shame and humiliation to janitorial work, cleanliness and neatness are not well-ingrained in our lives. It is important to change the image of those engaged in cleaning. Oriental people tend to consider janitorial work lowly and humiliating. Living in Europe made me understand why.

Conditioning cities for cleanliness

Most Italian housewives are organized in housekeeping. Without any househelp, sturdy and attractive housekeeping tools enable them to be precise and systematic in cleaning up their surroundings. As a student in Europe, I enjoyed the housekeeping chores with these convenient tools. Of course, my Montessori training, which emphasizes precision and love for work were what really made me appreciate keeping things in order. Even Montessori preschoolers are provided with eight kinds of brooms and dusters.

My attitude gradually changed when I was a student in Italy. Used to our dirty garbage trucks, I would stand fascinated by the Italian dump trucks as they hauled up from covered holes in the sidewalks the household garbage bins. Heavy plastic garbage bins were provided by the city mayors everywhere, even in small towns. The collectors wore neat gray jumpsuits, and they were as good-looking as Juancho Gutierrez.

Later in the mid-eighties, I worked in Paris as the Philippine delegate to the Executive Board of UNESCO every spring and fall sessions. Then, I had to wake up at 6:30 a.m. since the garbage trucks always started their morning collection near Place Victor Hugo, where I was renting a furnished studio. These big men, who were immigrants from Turkey wore dark green jumpsuits.

At night, I tidied up my flat and dropped my basura (waste) packed in plastic bags in one corner of the kitchen. Each apartment kitchen had a hidden chute where one drops all the disposable household wastes during the day. They all end up in huge garbage cans in the basement. Twice a day, once in the morning and the second time late in the day, the garbage collectors wearing heavy gloves pull out these heavy plastic drums. The pick-up is checked by the building concierge. He or his wife sees to it that the basement has sufficient garbage bins.

The French are fond of pet animals. Dogs are regularly walked. The city provides special sidewalks marked by the white silhouette painting of a dog where pet owners can make their animals regularly do their “toileting.” During the day, small vans with jet sprays and large rotary brushes clean up these spots.

Cleanliness is next to godliness

Evangelical groups would usually assemble in big open venues like the Quirino Grandstand in Roxas Boulevard. One would think these religious gatherings would lift up the spiritual awareness of its members. Yet, after a whole evening of exercise, the venue will usually be left cluttered with paper and plastic scraps, as if llitterbugs instead of God’s children convened in that area.

Now, multiply these incidents weekly due to the numerous religious or political meetings at Rizal Park, CCP and other open space assembly sites of the country.

Spread the word

If you have made it through my column, you have already invested time and energy in changing the ways of your family and your business. Here is something else you can do: Spread the word, let other families and business people know there are things they can do right now to help protect the environment.

There is no question as we approach year 2014, that this is a critical point in human history. We can make a commitment to keep the earth safe and livable for future generations or let it continue to deteriorate. Families and businesses have more power to do either of these than any other institution in our society.

Is there really any choice to make?

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