That morning, 20 young people gathered on the Ciliwung River, which traverses two densely populated provinces in Java, West Java, and DKI Jakarta. Some of them sat leisurely chatting with each other. Some sipped coffee, but many were busy preparing rubber boats. One of the young people seemed enthusiastic as he pumped air to inflate the rubber boat.

The young people who willingly woke up early seemed eager to rave about the Ciliwung. The river upstream in the Cibulao area, Bogor, West Java, had captured their attention. Starting from the rainy city corner, millennials were ready to cast their eyes on the current condition of the river flowing into the Jakarta Sea. Slowly, the rubber boats were paddled, and the journey began. The brown water appeared rippled, affected by the paddle's swing. Not far from the starting point, these impromptu paddlers were busy cleaning the paddles. Plastic waste refused to compromise, sticking to the paddles.

"Ah! We got a mattress cover here!" exclaimed Aurelie Moermans- Aurelie is a famous artist from Indonesia, and she is one of the WWF-Indonesia supporters. Her finger pointed to a king-sized bedsheet stuck across a large rock and looked surprised. WWF-Indonesia intentionally invited supporters to "taste" the waters of the Ciliwung River. Instead of enjoying it, Aurelie's eyes widened even more. "Wow! There's a plastic 'monster'!" shouted the 1993-born actress, pointing at plastic waste. Unrecyclable packaging clung to the roots of trees along the riverbank. Shortly afterward, Aurelie was seen busy taking selfies in front of the "monster." Not only plastic waste was found along the way, but human waste sometimes also passed by. If we explore, plastic waste making Aurelie's eyes widen is not a new story. In Indonesia, the amount of waste reaches 175,000 tons per day, with DKI Jakarta alone dumping 7,000-7,500 tons per day into the Ciliwung River. About a quarter of this amount is plastic waste.

In 2022, Waste4Change research showed that there is at least 87.52% or 244.72 tons per day of flexible plastic waste generated in the DKI Jakarta area, which still ends up in the final disposal site (TPA). Of this total, only 2.99% of flexible plastic is recycled, 0.78% is processed in PLTS, and 8.72% is unmanaged and can end up in the river. The amount of Jakarta's waste in two days equals the height of Borobudur Temple. This staggering fact is heartbreaking. So, can the issue of plastic waste attract the attention of young people in Indonesia? Apparently, to reduce plastic waste entering nature and consumed by marine mammals. This is supported by data from Wageningen University in 2018, which shows that 20,000 five-millimetre plastic items enter the Java Sea every hour. WWF-Indonesia, through the Plastic Smart City (PSC) program, strives to reduce plastic waste entering nature by 30% in Jakarta, Bogor, and Depok. In addition to working with the Waste Bank, this program also focuses on young people to reduce plastic waste consumption but nowhere to start. It's called the Youth Activist (YES) program.

The program began with a high number of WWF-Indonesia volunteers, mostly young people who wanted to participate in reducing plastic waste. We then designed a program in collaboration with the Yayasan Pembangunan Berkelanjutan (YPBB) to create a roadmap for individuals, especially youth, who want to reduce plastic consumption in their daily lives. Among these roadmaps, an audit of individual plastic waste is conducted to determine the amount of plastic consumption before participating in this program. The results will be compared at the end, revealing the amount of plastic consumption generated during the six months of the program. This program is divided into two parts: mentors and young activists. Mentors are young people aged 25-35 who will guide their younger counterparts. In the first batch, mentor registrations were opened through WWF-Indonesia's social media. Initially, there were 100 applicants, and they were interviewed and selected down to 20 people. This selection was done to assess the commitment of mentors, given the time commitment involved in the mentoring process. Of these 20 mentors, we conducted offline training, including plastic waste audit methods, managing organic waste with the Takakura basket method, public speaking, and more.

In the first batch, 200 young people registered as Youth Activists. After going through the interview process, the committee narrowed it down to around 149 people. This limitation was imposed due to the limited number of mentors and resources to manage this program. For the mentoring of young activists, one mentor is responsible for mentoring 5-7 Youth Activists (YA). After being paired with their mentors, various tasks awaited them, and the program was conducted online every two weeks. Mentors also had the task of checking on their mentees' progress in completing the assigned tasks. One of the YA members is Dwi Ninta P or Phita. The 24-year-old woman shared that she was already aware of the need to reduce plastic waste but was unsure how to start. Phita was summoned when she saw the news about several stranded whales. "During the autopsy, there was about 1 ton of plastic waste in the stomachs," Phita said while covering her face. "From there, I thought that some of the plastic in the whale's stomach might be from mine," she continued with a sad face. Phita then began searching for ways to reduce plastic waste individually. Although she found some information during the journey, it was still challenging to implement.

During this process, Phita saw WWF-Indonesia's social media looking for young people interested in joining the Youth Activist program. "Wow, that's perfect," Phita said. Without hesitation, Phita registered, and after the interview, she was accepted. Together with 149 other YAs, Phita began her journey to reduce plastic waste. The program started by presenting facts about why it is essential to reduce plastic waste and the types of plastic waste, namely single-layer and multilayer. Multilayer plastics are the most challenging to manage, such as the metallic inner layer of food packaging. This type of waste must be separated before it can be managed. The crucial part is the individual plastic waste audit. This audit is conducted to determine the daily plastic consumption or usage habits. In their daily activities, these young activists had to count and photograph the types of plastic they used for one week. After one week, the number and weight of plastic consumption were determined. Then, they started reducing plastic waste by bringing their water bottles and complete meal containers with utensils for every activity. This number would then be compared with the results of the YA program or for three months, showing the reduction figure.

"At first, it was tough," said Phita. She continued, "There are many temptations, friends inviting me to buy food with plastic. And if my dining place is dirty, I can't buy more because it hasn't been washed or I forgot to bring it." Phita admitted that she was sometimes still tempted to buy instant noodles with plastic. "But over time, I felt ashamed because we were in the environment of environmental activist friends who are passionate about reducing plastic waste," she explained with enthusiasm. "Now I bring a tumbler and food container everywhere. Also, I started encouraging people at home to separate their plastic waste," Phita added. The YA program, in 2023, entered batch 2, and Phita registered again, but this time she moved up as a mentor. The final figure for the reduction in this batch 1 program is 56.7%, obtained from the total of the first audit (baseline) being 10.76 kg, while the total of audit 2 is 4.6 kg, meaning a reduction of about 6 kilograms in one week. Then, this reduction program was extended to 3 months, resulting in a successful reduction of 56.7 kg of plastic waste. This figure may seem small, but it is not the goal; the more crucial aspect is the behavior change of its members. If all young people in Jakarta, Bogor, and Depok participate in this program, the amount of plastic waste reduced would be 248 tons per day. In other words, this program can at least reduce plastic waste entering nature, including the Ciliwung River.