Building an awareness of the environment in Indonesia is not as easy as it may seem.  Long-term bad habits need years before they can be changed for the better.  As small example is that, the vast majority of people in Indonesia do not throw rubbish in the bin as a habit.  As a result, the environment has become dirty, is being destroyed and polluted.  Unfortunately, even today we still do not see many people changing their behaviours and addressing waste problems.

The business of changing habits so that people throw rubbish in the bin can start in the household.  Being equipped with the knowledge and skills to know what to do with rubbish is essential.  Parents play a key role in this.  Parents need to educate their children about the environment, especially about rubbish.  By providing environmental education for all, bad habits can start to be changed.

The women’s group, “Mawar Bersemi” (Rosebud), in Desa Sanur Kaja, from October 2003 until now, have been working towards changing the thinking of the households in their neighbourhood.  Environmental education sessions are held every month for them so that they can then go home and teach their families.  The families in Gang Mawar, Nuri and Merpati have had much support with ongoing waste management systems in their area.

Their hard work can be seen by the results at the Neighbourhood Waste Management Depot in Sanur Kaja.  Apart from that the knowledge and skills of the individuals have been increased. Desa Sanur Kaja has received many guests, both groups and individuals.  All of the guests have the same goal – to know how to build community awareness and concern about sampah.

Apart from that, their hard work has resulted in rewards from the government.  The goal has not been to win competitions or get prizes but instead it has been about a change in thinking about waste management.  However, whether the goal was to get rewards or not, it has had a positive effect for on community. They have been champions at various levels ranging from village through to national champions.

The success has made the group justifiably proud, but still they evaluate their successes.  At the meeting on the 10th of May, the head of the Mawar Bersemi group, Ms. Dayu Widnyani reminded again the members that they must be able to maintain and indeed increase their capacity to manage their environment.  As a result, she said, they must always work towards increasing awareness and clarify issues to do with rubbish.  Always keeping a clean house, routine waste separation and greening their surrounds are essential elements of this.

Catur from PPLH Bali, in her role as activity moderator, added that their activities could be about learning.  Despite running for two years now, the activities are not achieving the most they can.  Rewards and visits from the Secretary to the Vice President, Indonesian Ministry of Environment, teachers and school students can challenge the group in their endeavors.  Consequently, this activity needs to continue and issues that are not yet resolved need to be cleared up.  Another item raised by Catur was that this program has as results because all parties involved has have worked together with one vision and that is to tackle the problem of waste.  (ctr/nel)

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