Wayag Plastic

While we continue to be stunned by the scenery of the islands of Indonesia, we continue to shudder at the amount of plastic waste that is disposed of into the oceans.

Here at Wayag in Raja Ampat, we are in a remote area of Indonesia and thought we may have escaped the volume of rubbish that we have seen thrown on the streets of the cities and towns we have visited. But that is not the case.

We are now anchored near to a sand bar that dries at low tide, and runs with current when the tide is in. This current brings the rubbish, and the shape of the sandspit catches large amounts on the shore. We have spent hours, day after day, collecting huge quantities of this plastic waste. The waste consistently contains specific items; oil bottles, shoes, and thongs water bottles and lids off bottles, plastic cups with an awful clear cellophane lid, and clear bags of various sizes.

After several days of removing around a cubic metre of this rubbish, day after day, the stream of new rubbish coming in on the tide remains undiminished. There is nowhere to take this rubbish. We not aware of any waste processing system in Indonesia. All we have seen is rubbish being burned on the roadside. Once removed from the ocean, our only option is to burn this plastic. It is too badly damaged for re-cycling, and too far from any facility.

The solution to this problem must lay with recycling, but this solution is beyond the scope of this poor country.