Environmental Problem Issues of garbage in the Philippines

By: Christopher Henry Ng

In the year 2008, most people never cared about where to put their trash. Others don’t throw in proper trash bins, others just drop the waste on the street and they contribute to garbage problems in the Philippines. Waste Management Commission shows that there are 677 open dumpsites, 343 controlled dumps, and 21 landfills in the country. An additional 307 dump sites are subject for closure or rehabilitation plans but without definite schedules for enforcement. About 215 additional landfills are being proposed to be set up nationwide.

The more waste in the Philippines causes the increase in global warming, high temperature and less oxygen because of the air pollution.The Philippines’ trash increased by 40 percent in 2010 and the ocean found 1,355,236 items of trash and people, nearly 400,000 volunteers, gather from around the world just to help in the Philippines.

The lists of the garbage in the ocean were plastic bags 679,957, paper bags 253,013 and food wrappers 103,226. Also recovered were 38,394 pieces of clothing and shoes, 55,814 tobacco-related items including cigarette butts 34,154, lighters and wrappers, and 11,077 diapers. These can cause poison and toxic in the ocean and you may see these trashes in some body of water like the Manila Bay.

In 2006, garbage increase 76 percent of the garbage was made of plastic and 51 percent was plastic bags at Manila Bay.

In September 27, 2009, Ondoy's flood caused millions of water hit around in the Philippines then the Ondoy's cyclone also left behind 10 times the usual garbage accumulated in Metro Manila.

The trash collected by Ondoy blocked some sewages in the streets that caused poor water drainage, mud and more water. People are cleaning 24 hours and are struggling in different location since September 26 and continuously heavy rain and the trash moves down at the mountain and where the garbage place is.

It was difficult to clean up after Ondoy because there was garbage everywhere and not only that but there are equipments, appliances and furnitures too. These things became useless because they were submerged in water and they are no longer working. In September 30, some areas are already cleaned all the places but there are still trashes in some areas that people don’t attend to.

For me, this is something really scary because I don’t know what would happen to the Philippines in the future. With simple things like cleaning up garbage can’t be done, what more for bigger things. Would you expect that the Filipinos would progress? Of course not. That’s why it’s a scary thing because you’ll never know what is going to happen in the next years to come. For the youth, there is still a chance to improve our garbage problem by simply starting with our own neighborhood first. I’m sure it would go a long way from there.