Why❓ Popped out of Illegal Plastic Recycling Factories in Jenjarom

*Updated*

 

Hello everyone! This post will cover the reason of illegal plastic recycling factories popped out in Jenjarom. If you do not know or you have forgotten the current issue happened on those factories, go have a look with my previous post. You will have better understanding on the illegal plastic recycling factories context.

 

RNZ investigates New Zealand’s plastic pollution in Malaysia

 

[ Rise of demand ]

The government is shutting down some illegal plastic recycling factories in Kuala Langat, Selangor to prevent further harmful towards the human and environment. But, how those factories actually appeared?

According to the Radio New Zealand (RNZ) website, Malaysia has become a popular alternative for UK, Australia, and New Zealand to export their plastic waste since China banned plastic import early in 2018. Before that, China is the destination of around 50% waste from the world.

Due to the changes of China policy, the enormous waste has to find a new place to go. And Malaysia, which accepts the importation of waste, is targeted by foreign countries to solve their wastage problem.

From 2016 to 2017, Malaysia annual imports of plastic waste has already changed from 288,000 tonnes to 450,000-500,000 tonnes based on Reuters. Not to mention what will Malaysia becomes when it needs to fill up the hole left by China.

Almost 40 illicit plastic waste factories set up in recent months to fulfill the demand. Jenjarom, a town of Kuala Langat district in Selangor, is the main area for those factories to hide.

 

Image via Charles Santiago/Facebook

 

[ No solutions for now ]

To inspect the condition of Jenjarom’s plastic waste factories, the local resident and chemist by profession Lay Peng Pua told RNZ that the local authorities had made a surprise visit to 38 factories in July. Unfortunately, they found that only three factories had recycling permits.

One of the possible reasons government cannot affectively settle the problem is corruption. Many “local authorities are paid off by the factory owners to ignore their illegal activities, with enforcement virtually non-existent,” Lay said in The Coverage, a social news network.

Meanwhile, The Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change Minister, Yeo Bee Yin also gave comment in The Star report.

 

“Many illegal factories are adopting a wait-and-see attitude. Once they see that the government has stopped taking action, they may start their operations again,” Yeo said.

 

Yeo said that the illegal factories will not stop operate even though the government has taken action. The factories will seek chances to operate ‘secretly’.