By: Muhammad Addib Mahsun (Marine Buddies Surabaya Community)

The Earth Hour Surabaya community together with Marine Buddies Surabaya and other Surabaya youths carried out the "KUPAS TUNTAS" (Collect Plastic, Write, and Weigh at the Waste Bank) action to commemorate the National Waste Awareness Day (HPSN). The action, which took place along Darmo Street during Car Free Day (CFD), not only collected plastic waste, but also educated visitors on the dangers of plastic waste. Together, we recorded the collected plastic waste and sorted it to be channeled to the Waste Bank so that it could be reprocessed.

The action on Sunday, February 25, brought together 130 Surabaya youth, consisting of Earth Hour Surabaya, Marine Buddies Surabaya, Nutrifood, Indonesian Environmental Engineering Student Association (IMTLI), IMTL UINSA, KPPL ITS, HMITL UNAIR, and HMITL UPN. In the action, we divided into four big groups to pick up plastic waste along the CFD road. Along the way we did not forget to educate other road users about the dangers of waste for the environment, such as plastic waste that settles on the ground is very difficult to decompose. Not only that, plastic waste that is carried to the sea and decomposes into microscopic is also very dangerous for our marine life, so that many plastics are eaten by marine biota.

After collecting the waste, we did the data collection by sorting the waste that can still be distributed to the waste bank. The 4 kg of plastic waste we found was divided into several types, namely plastic bottles and plastic packaging waste. Unfortunately, the bad habit of littering is often found at CFD Darmo Surabaya from the amount of waste collected.

Perhaps, it will be difficult for us not to use plastic, but we can start from ourselves, such as not buying bottled mineral water when traveling, bringing a totebag every time we shop or bringing a food container every time we want to wrap food.

Considering that Indonesia is the largest producer of plastic waste in the world after China, we as the next generation of the nation must be able to continue the struggle of our heroes to make this nation better by protecting our nature.