Jakarta, 13 July 2020: ERIA and the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA) held an Online Joint Dialogue on Waste Management in the Context of COVID-19 Pandemic, as a follow-up to the Resolution on Establishing the AIPA-ERIA Joint Dialogue to Support the Waste Management for Sustainable Development, which was held in Bangkok, Thailand last year.
The objective of the programme was to open discussions with parliamentarians in accordance with their roles to help mitigate the spread of the virus in their respective countries, as part of raising awareness about current and potential waste management issues derived from the pandemic.
Professor Hidetoshi Nishimura, the President of ERIA, and Hon Ms Nguyen Tuong Van, Secretary-General of AIPA, in their opening remarks both emphasised that the pandemic should be perceived as an opportunity to create better waste management for the long term, as well as make waste a resource.
There were two different sessions in the joint dialogue. The first discussed municipal solid waste due to the pandemic, while the second focussed on medical waste. In the first session, Professor Enri Damanhuri, from Institut Teknologi Bandung, spoke of the condition of municipal solid waste due to COVID-19 in Indonesia and Japan (on behalf of Mr Michikazu Kojima, ERIA Senior Economist). He said the pandemic had created changes in people’s lifestyles because of a greater reliance on online delivery services to obtain their daily needs, which frequently come with layers of packaging. An inevitable consequence of this was a rising amount of plastic waste in many cities.
Prof Damanhuri also noted that protection was very poor for the huge number of informal waste workers in Indonesia due to COVID-19, because many of them still have to work without personal protective equipment (PPE). In contrast, in Japan, waste collection workers use masks while they work, and there are clear instructions to dispose of the face masks and items used by those infected or suspected of infection – a safety measure to reduce contact between waste collection workers and the waste.
Prof Damanhuri said he hoped governments could give more recognition to the waste management issue by providing proper waste management technology and more financial support, especially in Indonesia where domestic waste management only receives 0.6% of the total local government budget.
In the second session, Professor Agamuthu Pariatamby, from the Jeffrey Sachs Centre on Sustainable Development, Sunway University, and a High-Level End Foreign Expert for China's Ministry of Science and Technology, gave a presentation on clinical waste management during COVID-19 in Malaysia.
Prof Pariatamby said the pandemic was highly connected to an increase in clinical waste generation, such as disposable gloves, face masks, and PPE. Clinical waste management in Malaysia is regulated under the Environmental Quality Regulation 2005, which states that it is highly fundamental to manage clinical waste properly before disposing of it as it could be harmful for the surrounding environment. As a result, clinical waste is disposed of based on the provision of colour-coded containers and bags: blue for autoclaving clinical waste, yellow for waste that goes to incinerators, and black for general household waste.
Prof Pariatamby concluded by saying that Malaysia has been doing great in managing the clinical waste from healthcare facilities. However, more attention is required for household clinical waste to protect waste collectors from health risk exposure due to the skyrocketing number of used face masks.
Mr Boonsong Kaigate, from Thailand's Parliament, spoke in the final presentation on the management of infectious waste in his country. At the beginning of the pandemic, the amount of infectious waste in Thailand jumped significantly, then began to decrease in April 2020 when infected cases started to fall.
As a response to COVID-19, Thailand prepared a three-step emergency plan to support infectious waste disposal – collection, transportation, and disposal – involving stakeholders such as local governments, local healthcare, and military units. Mr Kaigate said the absence of guidelines for household waste disposal was an issue in Thailand as it could potentially spread the virus.
Prof Nishimura, in his closing remarks, encouraged communication between countries to share and adopt appropriate measures to overcome the challenges of waste management during the pandemic. He also asked for support from parliament members to revise the draft resolution on Creation of Joint Dialogue between AIPA and ERIA to Support the Waste Management for New Normal amid COVID-19.
Communication Desk
Jakarta, 13 July 2020: ERIA and the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA) held an Online Joint Dialogue on Waste Management in the Context of COVID-19 Pandemic, as a follow-up to the Resolution on Establishing the AIPA-ERIA Joint Dialogue to Support the Waste Management for Sustainable Development, which was held in Bangkok, Thailand last year.
The objective of the programme was to open discussions with parliamentarians in accordance with their roles to help mitigate the spread of the virus in their respective countries, as part of raising awareness about current and potential waste management issues derived from the pandemic.
Professor Hidetoshi Nishimura, the President of ERIA, and Hon Ms Nguyen Tuong Van, Secretary-General of AIPA, in their opening remarks both emphasised that the pandemic should be perceived as an opportunity to create better waste management for the long term, as well as make waste a resource.
There were two different sessions in the joint dialogue. The first discussed municipal solid waste due to the pandemic, while the second focussed on medical waste. In the first session, Professor Enri Damanhuri, from Institut Teknologi Bandung, spoke of the condition of municipal solid waste due to COVID-19 in Indonesia and Japan (on behalf of Mr Michikazu Kojima, ERIA Senior Economist). He said the pandemic had created changes in people’s lifestyles because of a greater reliance on online delivery services to obtain their daily needs, which frequently come with layers of packaging. An inevitable consequence of this was a rising amount of plastic waste in many cities.
Prof Damanhuri also noted that protection was very poor for the huge number of informal waste workers in Indonesia due to COVID-19, because many of them still have to work without personal protective equipment (PPE). In contrast, in Japan, waste collection workers use masks while they work, and there are clear instructions to dispose of the face masks and items used by those infected or suspected of infection – a safety measure to reduce contact between waste collection workers and the waste.
Prof Damanhuri said he hoped governments could give more recognition to the waste management issue by providing proper waste management technology and more financial support, especially in Indonesia where domestic waste management only receives 0.6% of the total local government budget.
In the second session, Professor Agamuthu Pariatamby, from the Jeffrey Sachs Centre on Sustainable Development, Sunway University, and a High-Level End Foreign Expert for China's Ministry of Science and Technology, gave a presentation on clinical waste management during COVID-19 in Malaysia.
Prof Pariatamby said the pandemic was highly connected to an increase in clinical waste generation, such as disposable gloves, face masks, and PPE. Clinical waste management in Malaysia is regulated under the Environmental Quality Regulation 2005, which states that it is highly fundamental to manage clinical waste properly before disposing of it as it could be harmful for the surrounding environment. As a result, clinical waste is disposed of based on the provision of colour-coded containers and bags: blue for autoclaving clinical waste, yellow for waste that goes to incinerators, and black for general household waste.
Prof Pariatamby concluded by saying that Malaysia has been doing great in managing the clinical waste from healthcare facilities. However, more attention is required for household clinical waste to protect waste collectors from health risk exposure due to the skyrocketing number of used face masks.
Mr Boonsong Kaigate, from Thailand's Parliament, spoke in the final presentation on the management of infectious waste in his country. At the beginning of the pandemic, the amount of infectious waste in Thailand jumped significantly, then began to decrease in April 2020 when infected cases started to fall.
As a response to COVID-19, Thailand prepared a three-step emergency plan to support infectious waste disposal – collection, transportation, and disposal – involving stakeholders such as local governments, local healthcare, and military units. Mr Kaigate said the absence of guidelines for household waste disposal was an issue in Thailand as it could potentially spread the virus.
Prof Nishimura, in his closing remarks, encouraged communication between countries to share and adopt appropriate measures to overcome the challenges of waste management during the pandemic. He also asked for support from parliament members to revise the draft resolution on Creation of Joint Dialogue between AIPA and ERIA to Support the Waste Management for New Normal amid COVID-19.
Communication Desk
