Environmental expo a success

JAKARTA (JP): Participants and visitors to the Environment Expo 1997, which concluded yesterday, agreed the event was beneficial and should be held again soon.

Opened last Thursday by the State Minister for Environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja and coinciding with Environment Day, the exhibition featured 120 non-governmental organizations, government agencies, and state and private industries. Seminars, games and other related activities were also held at the Jakarta Hilton Convention Center.

A number of students and housewives visiting the expo told The Jakarta Post the event informed the public about the country's progress in environmental impact assessment, and helped them to understand how to better preserve the environment.

Among the participants was the Sea World Park in Ancol Dreamland, North Jakarta. It held a creativity contest for senior high school students.

Ika and Kartini, two SMEA 33 economic high school students, and Advia and Dewi of the SMU 67 high school, joined the contest and said it was a challenge for them to learn how to recycle and create new things, such as pencil cases, from scraps.

Another participant was the National Consortium for Forest and Nature Conservation in Indonesia (Konphalindo), an environmental group founded in 1991 to help raise public awareness about issues such as forest preservation.

The organization has conducted seminars and research in West Kalimantan, East Nusa Tenggara, West Java, Irian Jaya, and other parts of the country.

"We are glad people are becoming aware of the environment, as we can see from the increasing number of people who visited our stand," Tiwi of Konphalindo said. "Even the seminar we held during the exhibition was packed."

The coordinator of the Environmental Bureau of Irian Jaya (BLH) Baidiher Lingga, said that for the sake of the next generation, all Indonesians, not just the Irianese, were responsible for the preservation of the province's ecology.

Another participant was the National Network of Environment Study Center, which is associated with a number of universities in Indonesia. It was founded in 1985 and its central office is at the University of Indonesia in West Java.

The center conducts research and presents the results twice a year, according to one of the center's researchers Fauziah.

Imam Hendargo of the State Minister for Environment's office, said the expo was important given life was becoming increasingly inseparable from environmental preservation. (39)