MANILA-Senator Loren Legarda said that local government units (LGUs) could create more jobs through the implementation of Republic Act No. 9003 or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Law.
Legarda, principal author and sponsor of the law, made the statement during the recent hearing of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act which looked into the performance of relevant national agencies and LGUs with respect to RA 9003.
“By implementing the solid waste management law, San Fernando City in Pampanga was able to generate 200 green jobs, including those employed to manage the materials recovery facilities (MRFs),” she stressed.
According to Mother Earth Foundation, all of San Fernando City’s 35 barangays have their own MRFs, where waste materials are sorted for composting and recycling and the residual waste will be brought to sanitary landfills.
Aside from generating jobs, the city was able to save millions. The LGU used to spend 70 million pesos for solid waste dumped in a sanitary landfill in Tarlac, but now they only spend P7 million for bringing their mostly residual waste to the same landfill.
Moreover, waste diversion rate is at 55%, which means that instead of being brought to landfills, this much of waste is now either recycled or composted.
“Imagine if all LGUs implemented the law, it would be a cleaner and greener Philippines, more green jobs would be generated, and there would be decrease in incidence of environmental diseases. I hope our leaders will have the political will to implement the law at full speed,” said Legarda.
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