Indonesia to make corporate packaging waste management mandatory

Jakarta (ANTARA) - The Indonesian government is drafting a ministerial regulation on extended producer responsibility (EPR) to legally mandate that companies manage their product and packaging waste.

Environment Minister Mohammad Jumhur Hidayat said the upcoming regulation aims to shift the financial and logistical burden of waste management away from taxpayers and municipal governments and onto the private sector.

"We will soon issue a ministerial regulation on extended producer responsibility or EPR. We will require them (the private sector) to manage their waste," Hidayat said during the "Waste to Energy Talks: Reducing Waste, Powering the Future" event in Jakarta on Thursday.

According to the minister, nearly 10,000 factories in Indonesia that manufacture plastic-packaged products could fall under the jurisdiction of the new policy.

To help businesses comply with the impending mandate, Hidayat suggested the utilization of a Packaging Recovery Organization (PRO), a collective, industry-led entity designed to help member companies efficiently collect, track, and recycle packaging waste.

The policy push comes as government data reveals a critical waste management deficit in Indonesia. Daily national waste generation has reached approximately 141,926 tons, of which only 26 percent is properly managed, leaving 74 percent untreated.

Furthermore, 72 percent of final disposal sites (TPA) still operate using open dumping systems, and 36.59 percent of waste is discharged directly into the environment.

Hidayat noted that the government is currently calculating the exact financial and operational contribution formulas for producers under the EPR scheme.

The upcoming regulation will build upon the foundation laid by the Minister of Environment and Forestry Regulation No. 75 of 2019, which established a roadmap for voluntary corporate waste reduction.

The new policy, however, represents a transition toward mandatory corporate accountability.

Hidayat concluded by calling for a comprehensive end-to-end waste system, combining source sorting with advanced processing technologies like waste-to-electricity processing (PSEL), refuse-derived fuel (RDF), and pyrolysis.

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Translator: Aria Ananda, Yashinta Difa

Editor: Arie Novarina

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