By promoting alternatives to single-use plastic and enhancing waste management infrastructure, Bali can set an example for sustainable tourism. As a priority tourism destination, Bali is also at the forefront of Indonesia’s efforts to promote sustainable tourism.

 With national attention on the island’s environmental impact, there is a growing push to implement policies and partnerships that reduce plastic waste, ensuring Bali remains a model of eco-friendly tourism and preserves its natural beauty for future generations.

The Bali Provincial Government has been progressively developing various strategies and policies to implement sustainable tourism areas. Such policies cover reducing single-use plastic waste all the way to protecting lakes, springs, rivers, and the sea.

The province of Bali is also actively engaging in education efforts at various levels through media such as television, radio and online campaigns. To reduce plastic waste in Bali, several trash racks have been installed to collect waste from rivers near estuaries, aiming to prevent plastic waste from reaching the sea. The government of  Bali is also actively collaborating with the recycling industry to promote plastic waste recycling.

Littering is a  challenge for waste management in Indonesia. Combatting this habit does require effort to increase public awareness from an early age, that the type of waste produced has different characteristics from the type of waste produced by previous generations.

The probability of plastic waste leaking into the sea will be greater if the waste is thrown into water bodies, rivers or drainage channels. Waste that is thrown on land/yards can also reach water bodies with the help of wind and water runoff.

In 2021, a study showed that Indonesia is the fifth largest contributor of marine waste in the world. The World Bank states that specifically in Indonesia, plastic leakage into the ocean ranges from 201,000 to 552,300 tonnes per year, and most of the transport of plastic waste is through rivers.

Plastic waste enters river systems through natural transport mechanisms or direct discharge as a result of inadequate waste management or inappropriate community behaviour.

Once plastic enters rivers, hydrological parameters such as water level, flow velocity, and discharge will impact plastic transport. It is generally thought that all plastic found in rivers will end up in the ocean. However, 99 percent of plastic pollution is never found floating in seawater and is therefore considered “lost”. Another study has shown that this plastic sinks below the water surface…