Korean gov’t to ship trash dumped in PH back to Korea

The government of the Republic of Korea has assured that it will take measures to return to South Korea the garbage dumped in the country, the Embassy of Korea in the Philippines said on Thursday.

“The Government stated that it would take measures to have the wastes in question be brought back to Korea as soon as possible,” the embassy said in a statement.

Last July, 5,100 metric tons of plastic waste materials including dextrose tubes, diapers, batteries, bulbs and electronic equipment from Korea were dumped at the at the Mindanao International Container Terminal (MICT) in Misamis Oriental.

With this, the government will also probe the Korean exporter, noting that the garbage could be returned to Korea.

“The Government of the Republic of Korea—the Ministry of Environment, the Korea Customs Service, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs—has embarked on the investigation of a Korean exporter which caused a controversy in the Philippines this month,” it said.

The Embassy of Korea added that Korea’s Ministry of Environment and the Customs Service on Nov. 16 jointly inspected documents that covered the dumped garbage from its exporter based in Pyeongtaek City.

The Ministry of Environment and the Korea Customs Service then, confirmed that the exporter had delivered waste materials to the Philippines which had not gone through “proper recycling process” and that its “documents for export was forged.”

Last Nov. 21, The Ministry of Environment conducted a “legal procedure” to have the garbage dumped in the Philippines returned in Korea as per “Article 20 of the Law on Cross-border movement and Disposal of Wastes, Prior Notice of Repatriation Order.”

The Ministry also conducted an investigation after the exporter allegedly violated the Korean “False Export Declaration” law.

The Korea Customs Service is meanwhile currently investigating the exporter as it barred the exporter from shipping more waste materials. The name of the exporter was not disclosed by the Embassy of Korea. /muf

READ: Take back your garbage ASAP, South Korea told