From illegal dumping sites full of foreign-labeled packaging to small factories burning unrecyclable plastic, policy contradictions and industrial interests have turned Indonesia into a global dumping ground, at the cost of public health and the environment.
00:02It's a chalk production site where smoke billows 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
00:08What's fueling the everlasting fire it needs?
00:11Trash.
00:13We use all the unused waste, like old rubber, basically anything that can be burned.
00:21We usually need around two to three trucks, at least six tons of trash per burning round.
00:30Aceh runs this factory in Karawang, West Java.
00:34He tells us he buys unrecycled trash from traders every day.
00:38He knows burning it like this is controversial, which is why he doesn't want to give us his full name.
00:46Among the trash, we found all sorts of materials, including packaging from abroad and stuff that has been shredded for recycling.
00:54The same is likely true in many such factories in Indonesia.
00:59This is the kind of place that trash comes from.
01:02Nestled in the green fields of Banten province, a plastic mountain.
01:07Waste pickers find what they can sell.
01:09Most of it has been shredded, meaning it's been processed for recycling, and yet it's ended up here.
01:16What you see here are mountains of unrecycled shredded plastic from the industry.
01:22Now, while we cannot account for every single plastic that is being dumped here, we can tell that most of them do not even come from Indonesia.
01:30Figures from the Indonesia Central Statistics Agency show the country imported 258,000 tons of polymer waste in 2024.
01:40The idea is to produce plastic pallets or other products that can be reused.
01:46In January, the Environment Ministry banned waste imports due to concerns of whether the nation's overburdened waste management system could cope.
01:55But the imports barely slowed.
01:57The statistics agency says about 108,000 tons of plastic waste entered in the first half of the year.
02:05The industry ministry still permits plastic scrap imports if they are labeled as recycling raw material.
02:11Raw material which Indonesia needs and cannot produce itself.
02:16Muhammad Khalid is a professor in polymer technology and works for the Indonesia Olefin, Aromatic and Plastic Industry Association.
02:25With a waste management system that's still lacking in Indonesia, the quality of waste produced generally does not meet the requirements to be used as raw material for the industry that's importing plastic waste.
02:38But there is little to no proper treatment for what is left over, says Professor Khalid.
02:43What we see in Indonesia is that most incinerator machines are still very conventional.
02:49As a result, the burning process produces smoke and even dangerous substances such as dioxides and carbon monoxide.
02:58Misa is a researcher at Nexus 3, an NGO focused on environmental and health issues.
03:04They say the fate of imported plastic is something which should concern people whose trash it originally was.
03:10The public has to hold their governments accountable because the government says that, oh yeah, we have probably like 80 percent or 95 percent recycling rate in the countries, right?
03:22But then they don't know behind the scenes that those countries are sending this waste into our country, developing countries.
03:30The chalk factory and its everlasting fire stands as a constant reminder of Indonesia's waste management crisis.
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