Korve: Building Collective Awareness to Tackle Waste Issues

Malang (ANTARA) - On Sunday morning along Jalan Ijen in Malang City, East Java, the Minister of Environment (LH) Hanif Faisol Nurofiq, together with Malang City Mayor Wahyu Hidayat, Malang Regent M Sanusi, and civil servants (ASN) from the two Greater Malang regions, carried out a joint community service activity. They combed every point along Jalan Ijen, picking up rubbish using tongs and placing it into white hessian sacks. The location was chosen because it is the site of the weekly Car-Free Day (HBKB) in Malang City every week. This means there are people engaging in activities, providing space to campaign for korve as a collective movement to simultaneously tackle waste issues. In Malang City, Hanif urged the public to always pay attention to environmental cleanliness, so that its freshness and cool atmosphere remain preserved. Before Malang, Hanif and the Ministry of Environment team had already conducted korve or community service in Kalimalang (Bekasi Regency), Jimbaran Beach (Badung, Bali), and Surabaya City. Korve is a term that was once called for by President Prabowo Subianto when discussing waste management issues, through instructions during the National Coordination Meeting (Rakornas) of Central and Regional Governments for 2026 in Sentul, Bogor Regency, West Java, on Monday (2/2). In general, the term korve or kurvei is familiar in military and police environments. Its purpose is to maintain the cleanliness of shared facilities, discipline, and cooperation. Korve is a reflection of community service activities, mutual cooperation, or additional duties in the form of environmental cleaning efforts. Collective Awareness The Minister of Environment and regional heads agree that korve is not just a call, but needs to be cultivated as an instrument and the earliest way to address waste problems in order to create a clean, fresh, and healthy environment. Waste issues are a shared problem. Handling cannot be carried out by one party alone, but through collective methods to build korve as a fundamental foundation. The goal of korve is to form awareness of environmental cleanliness in the minds of the entire public, while implementing the Clean, Healthy, Tidy, and Beautiful Indonesia Movement (ASRI). Through this joint movement, the simplest thing can emerge, namely mutual respect between humans and nature, and that rubbish must be disposed of in its proper place.