‘Trash shipment may be sent back to Canada’
The pro-environment group EcoWaste Coalition yesterday welcomed Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s pronouncement that the shipment of garbage from Canada may be shipped back to its origin.
“We welcome the fact that he discussed this drawn out dumping controversy with President Rodrigo Duterte and committed to follow up on the matter. Like many of our colleagues, we are cautiously optimistic that Canada will be able to take their garbage back, but they should do it with greater urgency, and commit to making sure such unethical and unlawful dumping never happen again in the future,” said Aileen Lucero, EcoWaste Coalition National Coordinator.
“It is now theoretically possible to take it back,” Trudeau said, adding the legal obstacles have been addressed. "Canadian legal regulations prevented us from being able to receive the waste back to Canada. We had legal barriers and restrictions that prevented us from taking it back, but that's done now, but there’s still a number of questions around who would pay for it.”
Lucero said that EcoWaste Coalition and its partners in the environmental justice movement will remain alert to ensure that the shipment is sent back to Canada.
Zero Waste Canada, a non-profit grassroots organization dedicated to helping end the age of wasting through better design and education, recently emailed the EcoWaste Coalition affirming their “support in this much too long ordeal,” saying “we will continue to shine a light on this until it is resolved.”
A total of 103 shipping container vans loaded with mixed household garbage declared as scrap plastics for recycling arrived in Manila from Canada in 2013 and 2014.
Customs inspectors intercepted the garbage shipment after being alerted by the Environmental Management Bureau.
Importer Adelfa Eduardo and Customs broker Sherjun Saldon were subsequently charged in court for violation of Republic Act 6969 (Toxic Substances and Hazardous and Nuclear Wastes Control Act of 1990) and tariff and Customs laws.