Learning from Sagada’s clean and green name years ago

HAPPY WEEKEND

Gina Dizon

SAGADA Mountain Province -- A quick look at this town’s current waste management system shows no system working.  While  the municipal LGU submits its waste management plans yearly to the  Department of Interior and Local Government   in accordance with Republic Act  9003, the plan remains  a plan while plastic waste is  strewn all over the streets,  garbage is  dumped on the rivers, and  folks downstream  complain of  solid waste reaching their water systems.

It was  years ago when Sagada was reaping awards consecutively from  1995 to year 2000 for being a clean and green municipality till it reached a hall of fame award.  But that was before.  It is not anymore. It would be good to look back to the waste management system years ago and learn from there.

There was no need for a dump site then. What was evidently in place then was the presence of a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) site in the center of the town.  The presence of the MRF and the cooperation of the  community people were  good practises that were noted,  president of the Sagada Solid Waste  Association Inc (SSWAI) Jed Angway said. Used plastics, unwanted bottles and cellophane were collected and washed and collected at the MRF site located at a vacant lot near the municipal hall.  

It was an encouraging supportive act that the LGU then led by former mayor Thomas Killip assigned  utility persons to organize the recyclable waste collected at the MRF site wash the dirt off from the non –biodegradable waste. This, aside from other LGU support as the provision of materials for the building of the MRF and coordinating with other Manila-based individuals and groups working on waste management.

A local organization was organized with the support of Manila-based environmentalist Binggirl Clemente.  The SSWAI composed  of  young men and women, professionals,  elderly and retired teachers  were  active going around barangays, conducting  information and education  sessions and actually  showing how  an MRF site is operational.

SSWAI implemented an organizational waste management program in partnership with a supportive LGU where barangays were encouraged to set up their own MRF sites.  “SSWAI members went around monitoring households to practise  proper segregation of  waste,” Jed Angway said.

 SSWAI secretary Rose Baniaga-Wangdali said even other municipality LGU officers and officials  came to Sagada “to learn from us and we conducted IECs on waste management. ” Education sessions contained topics on  waste segregation and  what RA 9003 or an  “Act providing for an ecological solid waste management program, creating the necessary institutional mechanisms and incentives, declaring certain acts prohibited and providing penalties, appropriating funds therefor”.  Other municipalities were inspired and also built their respective MRF sites.

A strong executive will was obviously in place which set the waste management system in motion coupled with the initiatives of community folks and the support of other individuals and groups.

That was before when the waste management  efforts  were  collectively combined  with  the result of  community awards  sweet to the  ears  to listen to and nice to the sight to see garbage  properly  disposed of.

Now is a different sight with  garbage strewn all over,  plastic wastes  reaching water systems resulting to the  flooding of  rivers posing danger to  homes nearby river banks,  brought about by  plastic  materials accumulated in rivers  clogging the waterways.

 What happened?  Since the MRF was brought down on the site where the Centrum building was built in 2008, also led to the stopping of  SSWAIs waste management activities said the SSWAI  secretary.  The years dragged on with no community MRF under the leadership of Mayor Eduardo Latawan since 2007. The  LGU purchased a lot in 2012  supposed to be a landfill somewhere  in Ambasing overlooking the Lumyang cave  but was reportedly protested due to road right of way issues obviously  not ironed out before  any purchase happened.    

The LGU tried to build an MRF in 2011 with the initiative of CSMV vestry member and vice mayor Richard Yodong to negotiate with the church authorities of the St Mary the Virgin for an MRF site. The site located below the gasoline station at sitio Makamkamlis was approved by the vestry and remained a site only. A small building to house the MRF was built and a water tank was installed by the LGU in 2011 and ended there. Since then, the MRF did not see completion.  The rest is history.

What do we see now?  There is no systematic MRF for households and visitors  to bring non- biodegradable bottles and plastics except to wait for  a junk dealer from Isabela who comes to town irregularly.  Households and business establishments have their own ways of disposing their plastic and styrofoam garbage. Some burn. Some dump in other people’s waste box. Some throw down the river. Some store these in their homes. Some have their own incinerators. Some bring these at a junkshop far from the center town.

There is no method of recycling and pulverizing non-biodegradable waste into other useful material such as hollow blocks made from recycled  styrofoam and plastic waste. Nor even a composting site  for biodegradable waste to be made into fertilizer.  While community households have their own responsibility to dispose off their  wastes properly, the support of the LGU is equally a strong contributory  factor to realize a community-based  waste management system.    

With the LGU leadership now which takes the garbage problem lightly  and obviously no executive will to implement a healthy waste management system except to see to it that the waste is dumped and burned along Calvary Hill! Church authorities of  St Mary the Virgin irked over improper disposal of  waste  wrote Lawatan that the church shall close the  dumpsite as the manner of dumping  biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste mixed together is already posing threat to  sanitation and environmental health. The  arrangement being temporary urges the  LGU to look for better ways to handle the community’s  waste.

Lessons  learned and with the initiatives of barangay officials now for barangay-based waste management  ways along with the  collaboration of a junk shop owner  to collect  non-biodegradable stuff, added with the  long –delayed completion of the  MRF site and  its activation, lets the constituents of this tourist town  look forward to better disposition of waste and a satisfied  community as it continues to accommodate tourists contributing a major source of  income for the people especially residing in the Poblacion area.