GAIA member Yuyun Ismawati wins 2009 Goldman Environmental Prize

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

contact: Neil Tangri +1 (510) 684-5476

neil (at) no-burn.org

San Francisco, CA - April 20, 2009. Yuyun Ismawati of BaliFokus, Indonesia is being honored today with a Goldman Environmental Prize, the world's largest prize for grassroots environmentalists. Her groundbreaking work has created an environmentally sound, community-based waste management program in Indonesia. Ms. Ismawati recognized that waste is in fact a valuable resource-full of valuable recyclables and compostable materials. Just as important, she saw the potential of the informal sector recyclers (wastepickers): a worker-owned and managed solid waste cooperative now creates jobs that provide dignity and economic security. She explains, "It's about the quality of people's lives, their dignity, and the respect they get in society. When people are empowered, they can solve their own problems."

Carbon credits threaten groundbreaking program

Ironically, even as her work is being recognized internationally, it is being threatened by a "waste-to-energy" project backed by "climate-friendly" subsides. The GALFAD project's incinerator and landfill gas system have been awarded carbon credits by the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the Kyoto Protocol.

Despite the CDM's ostensible mission of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and promoting sustainable development, the GALFAD project is actually increasing GHG emissions. Proponents claim that it will avoid the release of methane, which results from the breakdown of organic waste in landfills. Yet most organic waste in Bali is fed to pigs; the GALFAD project would take that waste from farmers and throw it into the landfill in order to purposefully increase methane generation. Some portion of these emissions would then be captured and burned in order to claim carbon credits, while the rest escapes into the atmosphere.

The GALFAD project will not only increase greenhouse gas emissions and toxic pollution, but also displace the highly successful community-based waste program, destroying the livelihoods of some of the most vulnerable workers. Ms. Ismawati notes, "The local environmental agency told me they will stop supporting the community-based waste management project because they need to deliver more waste to the landfills in order to earn carbon credits."


Waste-to-energy plants increase greenhouse gas emissions

"This case is all too typical," according to Neil Tangri of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA). "CDM carbon credits have gone almost exclusively to incineration and landfill gas projects rather than recycling and composting, which are better for the climate and the economy. Meanwhile, those credits allow other industries to increase their emissions. It's a lose-lose proposition." As international climate change negotiations continue throughout 2009, GAIA and BaliFokus are working with activists worldwide to end abuses of carbon credit schemes such as the CDM.

Despite the threat of the GALFAD project, Ms. Ismawati remains optimistic about the strength and power of community-based programs. "Never underestimate people," she says. "The government keeps calling the scavengers and the recyclers who buy from them the 'informal sector.' But they've been doing this for decades, and the local factories would not survive without them. These programs are resilient. They survived SARS [bird flu], which closed many businesses."

BaliFokus (www.balifokus.org) is an Indonesian non-governmental organization focused on environmental management, cleaner production, pollution control and prevention, and sustainable development issues.

GAIA (www.no-burn.org) is a worldwide alliance of more than 600 grassroots groups, non-governmental organizations, and individuals in over 82 countries whose ultimate vision is a just, toxic-free world without incineration. GAIA is proud to count Yuyun Ismawati and BaliFokus among its members.

The Goldman Environmental Prize is awarded to individuals for sustained and significant efforts to protect and enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk. More information on Ms. Ismawati’s work is available at http://goldmanprize.org/2009/islands.

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