Credit: weather.com
A few decades ago, waste was mostly organic and biodegradable. Therefore, the careless waste disposal habits were not as harmful as they are today as waste eventually ‘disappeared’ back into the environment. However, the types of and quantity of waste is now very different. A huge percentage of the waste is now plastic and/or chemically hazardous, therefore, not biodegradable. As such, waste continuously piles up. It is clear that the waste disposal practices from a decade ago cannot be used with the waste of today.
Much of the local population do not know how to dispose of waste properly, and those who do (usually of higher socio-economic status) do not as they would rather leave it to someone else to do it for them.
In southern Bali (where most of the tourism is concentrated), more than 240 tonnes of solid waste is disposed of each day. The waste includes a lot of plastic waste as well as hazardous waste.
Credit: TripAdvisor
The picture above is a review that a tourist gave on his/her trip to Bali. The review mainly focused on the pollution that he/she faced while on vacation. Based on his/her observation, waste that polluted the beaches was mainly litter.
One trash related phenomenon that plagues Bali every year is the “Trash Season at Kuta Beach” (depicted in the picture above). During the month of January, strong currents wash tons of trash and debris accumulated in the water onto the beach. Among the debris is biodegradable waste (eg: timber, logs, coconuts, etc…), however, due to the new nature of pollution in Bali, non-biodegradable trash (bottles, plastics and other miscellaneous litter) is also being washed on shore.