Administration tells residents to dig in

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The city administration has requested the public dig one million biopores around homes and office buildings, to help the city combat floods.

Head of Jakarta's Environmental Management Agency, Budirama Natakusumah, told reporters Wednesday the city administration would launch a biopore program Saturday at Soemantri Brojonegoro youth center in Kuningan, South Jakarta.

A biopore is an organic waste disposal system which serves the dual purpose of allowing water to seep into the ground more easily.

They can be made simply using a specially designed hand-operated iron bore which drills into the ground, and creates a 1 meter-deep hole with a diameter of between 10 and 30 centimeters.

The hole can be used to dispose of organic waste such as leftover chicken bones, rotten vegetables or fallen leaves.

The buried waste attracts ants, worms and a variety of underground fauna which turn the garbage into compost. Animals may also create tunnels to access the waste which in turn allows rainwater to be absorbed into groundwater more easily.

"This is society's best tool to help the city combat flooding," Budirama said.

"The holes are very easy to make since one tool can be shared by hundreds of households," he said, adding that the tools would be distributed to some 200 community unit chiefs during Saturday's event.

The event will involve several non-government organizations and university students who will assist local communities to make and maintain the biopores.

The technique was first made public by Kamir Brata, a researcher from Bogor Institute of Agriculture (IPB), last year and has been applied in Bogor.

On April 22, Bogor city administration ordered the digging of 5,250 biopore holes in 21 of its sub-districts.

As of June, the city had dug more then 22,000 holes.

Kamir has been promoting the technology to Jakarta since.

"The problem with Jakarta's flood mitigation technology is that they are still separating water containment and waste disposal. These two areas are closely related and need to be addressed simultaneously," he said.

He claims to have introduced the technique to Jakarta officials around a year ago, but said he kept getting snubbed.

"I guess they thought the technology was too simple," he told The Jakarta Post in a separate interview.

"But it's good they're adopting it now, they are finally coming around," he said.

Budirama said the city also wants to build absorption wells under the city's flood prone streets but was waiting for the Jakarta Public Works Agency to release a concrete plan. (anw)