THE country is still grappling with solid waste management issues despite the implementation of the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000 or Republic Act (RA) 9003 for almost two decades now. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the situation with the surge of waste materials from the widespread use of disposable masks, shields, and personal protective equipment/gears, and other medical/healthcare supplies at both households and hospitals.
Under RA 9003, local government units (LGUs) serve as lead implementers of the law and are tasked to establish the blueprint for national and subnational plans and initiatives on waste management. This legislation complements the devolution of solid waste management to LGUs as mandated by the Local Government Code of 1991.
But the overly simplistic transfer of responsibility to local government units have resulted to two decades of mediocre policy grounding. This is manifested in many issues, including the presence of illegal dumpsites, unabated waste generation, suboptimal material recovery, lack of investment in technology and facility, and the weak participation of both private and public in solid waste management.
Despite these challenges, there are best practices at the local level that may be replicated by other local government units, for example, the legal waste facility transition of the Payatas dumpsite in Quezon City and the organization of its informal economy; the clustering of waste management service of Teresa, Rizal, its province-wide incentive mechanism and partnership with construction companies, and the market linkages for revenue generation.
Experts have also presented some ways forward to improve solid waste management. One is for the national government to play an active role in designing and financing sanitary landfills and to promote a “clustering approach” among adjacent LGUs because not all LGUs can host the establishment of engineered facilities such as those in Iloilo province.
Another is to augment the budget of LGUs for the establishment of waste facilities through other sources such as national to local transfers, aggregate arrangement between and among LGUs, and public-private sector arrangements.
And yes, there’s a need to provide relevant capacity-building interventions for communities and to strengthen information, education, and communication campaigns on waste reduction, segregation, reuse, and recycling at the local level.
