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Compliance with the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act will insulate local governments from suits and ensure victory for environmentalists.
But for 65-year-old scavenger Pablo Densing, the waste segregation scheme will cost him half of his monthly income.
Densing and his wife Aldrenica, 62, earn about P1,000 a week from scavenging at the Umapad dumpsite in Mandaue City.
But the segregation reduced the volume of trash, lamented Densing while pushing a cart filled with trash from the dumpsite.
Asked if he knew the purpose of the segregation, Densing said he did not know why.
Densing, a resident of sitio Urban in nearby barangay Paknaan, said the trash he got might look like a lot but he said this was just very small compared to what he usually got before the Umapad dumpsite was closed and barangay-based segregation started in June last year.
He said he envied those scavengers who were employed by the city government under Mayor Jonas Cortes as segregation staff in the city's Materials Recovery Facility (MRF).
When the dumpsite was closed, the city governnment hired around 60 segregation staff from among the 400 scavengers at the dumpsite.
There are also other segregation systems that operate in the barangay aside from the ones initiated by the city government and the barangay hall.
He said Rep. Nerissa Soon-Ruiz of Cebu?s 6th district has her own program ?Basura Mo, Panginabuhi Ko,? a segregation project earning cash for its members.
According to Edmund Sanchez, consultant on special projects, they hired former scavengers to take charge of the city's MRF.
This MRF is separate from each barangay's MRF because the city government is in charge of the collection of trash in major thoroughfares.
He said the rehabilitation of the Umapad dumpsite had not started yet because the budget had not been approved by the City Council. Right now, he said the city was still covering the trash with soil.
The ?Basura Mo, Panginabuhi Ko? also operates in Mandaue with supporters of Soon-Ruiz leading the project. Soon-Ruiz is challenging the reelection bid of Cortes in May.
Her program also allows schools to tap the resources of the coop for beautification programs or improvement of facilities in each school to be paid in the form of trash generated by students and parents in a given year.
Cortes, on the other hand, is planning to put up an eco-park at the Umapad dumpsite once rehabilitation works are over. He said that it was one of the long-term plans for the area.
The city is also looking into the clustering with other local government units in the province to come up with a common landfill?a proposal that has not yet progressed since it was announced last year.
