According to the latest figures, significant progress has been made by Project STOP and its partners in creating effective waste management systems to prevent plastics leakage into the ocean In Indonesia.
The programme, co-founded by polyolefins producer Borealis and SYSTEMIQ in 2017, works together with city governments to provide the expertise needed to create circular waste management systems in high-need areas of Southeast Asia.
Milestones to date include bringing waste management services to more than 133,500 people during the period through the end of 2020 as well as the construction of five material recovery facilities, able collectively to process 150 tonnes of waste per day. Moreover, already, over 8,123 tonnes of waste (1,118 tonnes plastic) have been prevented from leaking into the environment, stable jobs have been created for 168 waste-systems workers, a number projected to grow to more than 250 by the end of the programme and pilots of multiple governance models have been launched to support more stable, professional waste management. The project has also developed an extensive curriculum to train government and others to set up and operate waste systems.
According to Borealis, the project will operate at full scale by the end of 2022, at which time Project STOP’s current city partnerships with the coastal cities of Muncar and Pasuruan in East Java, and Jembrana, on the northwest coast of Bali will reach 450,000 people. It will have diverted 45,400 tonnes of waste out of the environment, including 5,700 tonnes of plastic through more circular, economically sustainable waste management.
The past year was especially challenging due to the outbreak of the pandemic, yet the project nonethless continued to deliver the ‘benefits we expected,’ said Borealis CEO Alfred Stern.
“We are grateful to all of the project’s frontline workers for keeping these essential services going during the pandemic.”
“It's truly a team effort," added Joi Danielson, a partner at SYSTEMIQ.
“We are looking forward to supporting an increasing number of cities to build modern waste systems and stopping thousands more tonnes of environmental pollution in the years ahead.”
Indonesia’s plastic consumption tops 6 million metric tonnes per year, and the country’s ocean leakage at roughly 1 million tonnes per year, is the second highest in the world. In response, the Indonesian government has created a Marine Debris Action Plan in 2017 committing itself to reduce the country’s ocean plastic flows by 70% by 2025. To contribute to this national commitment, Project STOP plans to further scale its activities across a wider region of Indonesia. A scale-up plan is currently being developed and will be implemented once agreed with the local authorities.
In addition to Borealis and SYSTEMIQ, Project STOP is grateful to its strategic partners who also provide technical expertise. They include the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, NOVA Chemicals, Nestlé, the Alliance to End Plastic Waste, Borouge and Siegwerk. The initiative’s supporting and technical partners are Veolia, Sustainable Waste Indonesia, Schwarz and HP.