Straws, tarps are plastics, too

Uriel Quilinguing . 

ALTHOUGH many experienced the inconvenience of carrying goods contained in paper bags instead of the usual plastic “sando” bags for almost a month now,  the campaign to reduce plastic wastes in Cagayan de Oro City is gaining grounds. For this, I commend the City Local Environment and Natural Resources Office (Clenro), City Hall’s lead enforcement arm of City Ordinance No. 13378-2018 for taking an extra mile.

The advocacy must be sustained and once the proper time comes, expanded so that it would live up to what the measure is known for – Integrated Ecobiological Solid Waste Management Ordinance.

Having a plastic-ban initiative is not new since many municipalities, cities, and provinces started on this years ago. And I could not find a plausible reason why it took this long for Cagayan de Oro City to realize the hazards single-use plastics pose.  

Metro Manila cities of Caloocan, Las Piñas, Makati, Muntinlupa, Pasay, Pasig, Quezon kicked off their anti-plastic drives three years ago. Even the cities of Cebu, San Carlos, Tagbilaran have been in their environmentally sound practice. 

In the past 10 years, I have observed how business firms in Mambajao, Camiguin comply after the municipal government tried to implement an anti-plastic measure. So far, it worked well in the capital town, even during rainy days. The provincial government has yet to adopt an island-wide campaign to totally get rid of plastic bags.

For Cagayanons, the crusade and conscious effort to reduce the use and disposal of plastic bags must ripple to nearby areas where residents continue to indiscriminately throw these non-biodegradable materials. Several rivers criss-cross Cagayan de Oro originate from landlocked Bukidnon and the city shares the same coastline as those of Misamis Oriental.  

From plastic bags, the city-wide ban must include single-use styrofoam, plastic straws and stirrers as well as regulate the use, reuse, recycle and disposal of polyethylene plastic tarpaulins.

While this campaign is being sustained, the city government must provide incentives for those who venture into the manufacture and marketing of fairly-priced ecobags, woven nipa strips (bayong) and cloth (katsa) bags.

While violators are penalized, compliant ones should also be publicly acknowledged.

(Uriel C. Quilinguing is a past president of the Cagayan de Oro Press Club and former editor-in-chief of this paper.)