More residents have availed of Cebu City’s Basura Mo, Sardinas Ko program such as the residents of Lower La Guardia who rush to the garbage truck collecting their garbage.
CDN file photo
Basura Mo, Sardinas Ko program
DEPARTMENT of Public Services (DPS) officials in Cebu City justified their P50-million budget proposal to rent garbage compactor trucks as it would make more systematic the implementation of the city’s Basura Mo, Sardinas Ko program.
Jerome Mañego, the DPS staff in charge of the program, said they could not expand the project from the current two pilot barangays, Cogon Pardo and Lahug, without additional compactor trucks to haul the garbage.
The city has four compactor trucks, but two are under repair, he told Cebu Daily News.
The program encourages residents, particularly those in densely populated interior sitios (subvillages), to properly dispose of their trash by exchanging a plastic bag full of garbage with one can of sardines. A sack of garbage is equivalent to two cans of sardines.
Last month, City Hall tried to expand the program to the Badjao community in Barangay Mambaling, but they could only do it once since there was no vehicle to carry the trash, said Mañego.
DPS head Roberto Cabarrubias earlier said the P50 million that they have proposed for inclusion in the planned supplemental budget will be used to rent 15 compactor trucks for the months of July until December this year.
He said that with the additional trucks, the city can expand the Basura Mo, Sardinas Ko program to the coastal barangays including Inayawan, Basak Pardo, Basak San Nicolas, Mambaling, Duljo-Fatima, Pasil, Suba and Ermita.
“It will be good if we have more compactor trucks so that we can be more efficient in cleaning our creeks and coastal areas from garbage,” Mañego added.
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña initiated the Basura Mo, Sardinas Ko program primarily to encourage residents near creeks to stop disposing of their trash in these waterways.
Mañego said that since they started the program early this year, residents are even competing with each other in cleaning the creeks and their own surroundings so that they will be able to exchange their collected trash with cans of sardines.
Aside from the P50 million for the rental of compactor trucks, the DPS is also proposing another P174 million for the city’s garbage-hauling program from July to December this year.
Cabarrubias said the computation was based on the projected average daily garbage generation of 700 tons from July to November, and rising to 800 tons per day in December due to the Christmas season.
The computation is also based on the current rate of P1,350 which the city pays to a private contractor in the hauling and disposal of the city’s wastes to a private landfill outside of Cebu City.
Although the planned supplemental budget is yet to be formally proposed to the Cebu City Council, some councilors already expressed concern on the city’s spending for garbage hauling.
If the proposal will be approved, the city will be spending a total of P316.8 million on garbage hauling for this entire year, more than double the P135 million that the city spent for garbage disposal in 2016.
But Cabarrubias stressed that the expense is vital to ensuring the city gets to collect its garbage properly.
So far, he said, the city’s garbage collection program has been going well.
“It’s okay. We have not encountered any problems with our garbage collection and disposal. Our trash are being properly collected,” Cabarrubias said.