Centralized sewerage system for healthy city environment

The development of the centralized sewerage system for Kuching city, though a very costly project, has to be undertaken primarily to re-clean the black and grey water or water that comes from bathrooms and kitchens, before they flow into the river. Actually, the project starts a new kind of development, which has never been done before but will increasingly become a prominent feature of urban development towards the year 2020 and beyond.

This project can be considered as a start in the new direction in the development of cities and towns throughout the state in future. It is a kind of recognition that the State has reached a certain stage of development where the people must be aware of what is going to be a livability standard for towns and cities in future.

In this regard, residents of a city or people leading urban life must consider it as something that makes them becoming more matured and wise in life. As citizens, it is incumbent upon them to take some of the responsibility of working together with the government and the local councils to maintain high standard of livability with clean and healthy environment in the city in future.

Chief Minister, Pehin Sri Haji Abdul Taib Mahmud, is reported to have said the State government, with the help of the Federal government, has to undertake the project as a guarantee for a clean and healthy environment for the city in future.

The government will not pass the capital cost to the people. However, they should be prepared to pay the maintenance costs or costs of running the system. In other words, the users or the people must be prepared to bear the costs of developing a system that can provide them with good, clean and healthy environment.

That is the price that the people must pay in order to have better living conditions and life in a good clean environment. The people should have no reason to complain about it.  Instead, they must be prepared to part with more money to maintain the environment for healthy living as much as they can spend more money on motorcars, motorcycles, luxurious houses or holidays.  Basically, the people should not, for all their worth, be contented to be living like in the past. 

The development of the first phase of the integrated sewerage system project costs more than RM530 million that makes it the most expensive undertaking in any urban development. The whole scheme will cost about RM2 billion but the government has no choice but to implement it.  The project will be implemented phase by phase starting with the worst polluting areas in the city namely Sungei Maong and Sungei Bintangor. Immediate steps must be taken to get rid of pollutants that are beginning to threaten the DOD standard in the river. As residents of the city, the people must brace themselves to embrace the new development.

The environment, which has already received number of international accreditations, in the city of Kuching must be maintained in order to retain its feature as a livable city. The fact that more and more people have decided to settle in the city is a manifestation of this. Generally, all cities and towns in the State have higher standard of amenities that attract more and more people to settle in them.  Besides, more and more people also feel that, as the State reaches a certain level of progress and prosperity, adding to the costs of maintaining and operating public facilities, is quite reasonable; it is not too heavy. Basically, the people must be prepared to share the costs of measures being taken to protect the environment.  

Greatest challenge

The greatest challenge, which has to be met at great cost, is to provide good clean water for the people in all cities in Sarawak.  In the case of the city Kuching, the State government is in the process of constructing a reservoir in Bengoh in order to meet the demand of the growing population of the city. It may be very difficult to find other places for new reservoirs in future. Hence, necessary measures must be taken to preserve Sungei Sarawak as possible sources of clean water. It is not inconceivable that in the not too distant future, the city may depend on Sungei Sarawak as the place to sheave water for industrial and domestic purposes.

Regrettably, as a result of past practices, Sungei Sarawak has become quite polluted though necessary actions are being taken to minimise the build up of pollution by controlling the sewerage; the measures will become more insufficient in future.  For example, the water being discharged from toilets, which is called black water, is only 40% clean.  Eventually, 60% of pollutants will find their way into the river.

The primary stage of the integrated sewerage system is to cut out the most densely populated areas, which are also considered as the most polluting areas of the city, to be free from black water or grey water in future. Now the water running from bathrooms and kitchens on the surface is not being filtered. The city cannot afford to allow more and more water from kitchens and bathrooms, with the continuous increases in the number of people living in the city, to find their way to the river. Necessary actions must be taken to ensure that the city of Kuching will not run short of water supply in future. 

Pehin Sri Abdul Taib, in one of his speeches in the State Legislative Assembly,  has already indicated to the Federal government that the problems of urbanization in towns and cities cannot be tackled by the State government alone. Arguably, if Sarawak cannot afford the huge costs to tackle the problems of urbanization, no other states can afford it. For example, it will incur huge costs to develop a good centralized sewerage system. Besides, the Federal government must also understand the principle by which the State Government operates the centralized sewerage system.

Besides, as the incomes of the people have increased tremendously, they must learn to pay for services to live in good, clean and healthy environment.  In this respect, they must be prepared to pay for the operating costs of good services from now onward. Actually, the launching of integrated sewerage system for the city of Kuching signals a start to a new kind of development, which has never been done before but will increasingly become a prominent feature of urban development towards the year 2020 and beyond.

Change in demographic patterns

The demography of Sarawak has changed drastically over the last 30 years through the process of development.  In early 80s or nearly 30 years ago, the population then was more than 70% rural dwellers and nearly 30%, urban dwellers. Today, the rural dwellers form only 39% of the population while those in town and city dwellers, 61%. In other words, the people in rural areas have become the minority while those in towns and cities become the majority of the population of Sarawak. 

Understandably, the change in demographic patterns necessitates demands for a new development strategy in order to find the way to better life. Essentially, urban development must have the objective to create environment for more sophisticated living, which entails providing better amenities to the people. Obviously, the city of Kuching has gained a lot of acceptance by the people.  Its population now is round 600,000. It is a different city from that in 1980s, which only had about 200,000 people. It can be expected that more and more people will live in bigger towns and cities as they get involved in the activities of modern economy. As a consequent, more areas will become densely populated in urban and the surrounding areas.

Generally, densely populated areas represent a challenge to the environment. In other words, while a city, with big population is good for the development of the economy, the challenge to maintain the quality of environment is great for the government.  For example, when the town was still small it had no problem in dispensing the garbage. However now, Kuching alone has a daily collection of more than 100,000 tons of garbage. That is a great challenge to the environment.

The new direction of development will be in synergy with the overall thrust of implementing the new economic model of high income economy for Sarawak like the rest of Malaysia. However, it requires efforts of the government and people to undertake it successfully.  In other words, the people, the government and the local councils must work together to raise the quality of living to a higher level towards the year 2020 and beyond.  For example, it is incumbent upon residents of the city of Kuching, which won many international accreditations in the 80s and 90s for being a clean town and one of the most livable cities in Asia, to keep up with the development in order to maintain its high standard of livability in future.

benuasains

*pics source: http://www.ssd.sarawak.gov.my/modules/web/page.php?id=109&menu_id=0&sub_id=92