Government Ignores River Management in Indonesia

 

Ning River at Mataram City NTB covered with Plastic Waste (3/1/2023)

(Mataram City, NTB, Wednesday 4/1/2023)The Nusantara River Expedition Team from March 2022 to December 2022 has conducted a survey on public perceptions of river management in Indonesia with a total of 1188 respondents who are domiciled in 166 cities in 30 provinces. 92% of respondents stated that the river ecosystem is very important for human life and supports Indonesia’s development, but 82% stated that the Indonesian government still ignores river management in Indonesia, the impact is that 68 Indonesian rivers are polluted with microplastics originating from shards of plastic waste thrown into rivers, Indonesia is a country the second fastest in the world in the extinction of freshwater fish. Apart from domestic (household) waste, namely waste and liquid waste, industrial waste, deforestation, mining activities, and palm oil and agricultural plantation activities pay for pollutants, pesticides, and fertilization. Indonesian people need the information to get to know the river better.

Indonesian Rivers are being Polluted

Brantas River, East Java Indonesia

90.7% of respondents stated that the current condition of the Indonesian River was Polluted (13.9% stated that it was highly polluted, 31.2% lightly polluted and 45.6% moderately polluted), while only 5.1% stated that the river condition was not polluted while 4.3% % stated do not know

In Government Regulation Number 22/2021 concerning the Implementation of Environmental Protection and Management, it states that Environmental Pollution is the entry or inclusion of living things, substances, energy, and/or other components into the Environment by human activities so that they exceed the Environmental quality standards that have been set. One of the environmental quality standards regulated in PP 22/2021 is that every river in Indonesia must contain zero waste.

Respondents mentioned that the facts stating that Indonesian rivers were polluted were:

1.      Indonesian rivers still find trash (70.7%)

2.      Indonesian river water was found to be foamy, discolored, and smelly (19.4%)

3.      There are still mass dead fish events in the river (3.5%)

These three facts can be the strong reasons that the government is not serious about managing water quality and neglecting efforts to control pollution resulting in the generation of waste in rivers, physical changes in rivers, and even the discovery of mass dead fish.