Senators push for inquiry on 5,100 tons of trash from S. Korea

At least two senators are now seeking a congressional inquiry into the reported 5,100 tons of trash that arrived from South Korea and which was discovered only this month of November.

Senators Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III and Nancy Binay, in separate resolutions they filed, said it is imperative that the Senate direct the appropriate committees to look into the matter, in aid of legislation, in consideration of the still unresolved garbage issue with Canada, “with the end view of preventing the Philippines from being a dumping site of the more advanced economies in this so-called global waste trade.”

“The Philippines appears to be well in the path of the so-called ‘global waste trade’ and Congress has to act swiftly to prevent the country from being a dumping site of the more advanced economies,” Pimentel said in the explanatory note of Senate Resolution No. 939.

“Protecting and advancing the right of the people to a balanced and healthful ecology is a Constitutional duty and an intergenerational responsibility,” the senator added.

Based on the initial findings of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), the garbage shipment contained used dextrose tubes, used diapers, batteries, bulbs and electronic equipment.

The said shipment, which arrived at the Mindanao Container Terminal (MCT) in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental on board MV Affluent Ocean in July 2018, was misdeclared as “plastic synthetic flakes.”

It was only after the Bureau of Customs Region 10’s Intelligence and Investigation Service requested for an alert order last October 25, when it was discovered that the shipment actually contained plastic wastes, wood and other rubbish from South Korea.

The shipment was consigned to South Korean company Verde Soko II Industrial Corp., which runs a waste recycling facility in Tagoloan town. But the said company is not registered as an importer of recyclable materials.

Binay, in filing Senate Resolution No. 942, reminded that the Philippines is signatory to the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal, an international treaty designed to reduce the movements of hazardous wastes between countries specifically to prevent the transfer of hazardous waste from developed to less developed countries.

The DENR, she said, is also mandated to prohibit the entry even in transit of hazardous wastes and their disposal into Philippine territorial limits under Republic Act No. 6969 or the “Toxic Substances and Hazardous and Nuclear Wastes Control Act of 1990.”