Dewagacor99
A government worker picks up trash along river in Paranaque, Metro Manila.
Using a long-handled net, Ronnel Narvas scoops up discarded plastic soft drink bottles, shopping bags and palm-sized sachets as he wades through a foul-smelling tributary in the Philippine capital Manila.
“It’s disappointing, because no matter how diligent we are at cleaning up, the garbage does not run out,” Narvas told AFP of the never-ending battle against trash.
“But we need to persevere… at least we are managing to reduce it instead of letting it pile up more.”
The Philippines produces about 61,000 tons of trash every day, up to 24 percent of it plastic, figures from the environment department show.
The country is the world’s top source of plastic that ends up in the oceans, a 2021 study by Dutch non-profit The Ocean Cleanup found.
It said the Pasig river, which flows through the capital and into Manila Bay, is the “most polluting” in the world.
