Officer says 'ecolabeling' will benefit local firms

Officer says 'ecolabeling' will benefit local firms

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government is claiming that the planned national
"ecolabeling" measures will help ensure that manufacturing and
agricultural products are accepted by developed countries.

Deputy for the Supervision of Technical Infrastructure of the
Environment Management at the Office of the State Minister for
the Environment Masnellyarti Hilman said many advanced countries
such as Germany, Japan, Singapore and Canada now required
Indonesian products to be certified with an ecolabel, which
guarantees a certain level of environmental protection during
production.

Without an ecolabel certificate, Indonesian products would not
be accepted in those advanced countries, she added.

"So we're trying to meet the developed countries' requirements
as well as encouraging local firms to respect the environment,"
she told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

Masnellyarti said the planned national ecolabel campaign would
adopt some of the advanced countries' ecolabeling standards, but
not all.

"It is impossible to adopt all their standards as we do not
have all the required laboratories or instruments to do so and
this will be very expensive for firms," she said.

Under the plan, the government will set a criteria for firms
in order for them to obtain the certificate, according to her.

It was not immediately clear if the Indonesian standards for
ecolabeling would be recognized by the foreign countries that
adhere to international standards.

Masnellyarti said the government would set the maximum level
of electricity, water and chemical substances a company may use
for a product.

The firm's waste would also be measured whether or not it
surpasses the maximum requirement set by the Office of the State
Minister for the Environment, Masnellyarti added.

"This criteria has not yet been decided yet...," she said.

So far, the government has formulated a criteria for tissue
and packaged paper products to obtain an ecolabel certificate.

For example, in the production of a ton of tissue paper, the
process must not exceed 40 cubic meters of water waste, 750
kilowatts per hour of electricity, in addition to several other
measurable limitations.

The tissue paper firms must also use chemical substances that
are at least 90 percent biodegradable, and in line with the
amount of liquid waste as stated in the Decree of the State
Ministry for the Environment No. 51/1995 and possess a certified
environmental management system.

Masnellyarti went on to say that a third party would issue the
ecolabel certificate to a firm after testing based on the
criteria issued by the government.

The government earlier said that it would implement a national
ecolabel measure in June next year for manufacturing and
agricultural products.

A consortium consisting of the Office of the State Minister
for the Environment, Ministry of Trade and Industry, the National
Standardization Agency (BSN), the Indonesian Consumers Foundation
(YLKI) and the Indonesian Ecolabeling Institute (LEI) are now
working on the ecolabeling measure.

At present, only wood product manufacturers have introduced
ecolabeling, organized by LEI, to help them pass requirements
from developed countries.