Meaning “Protect Nature” in Indonesian, Peduli Alam was created in 2008 by French citizens and Bali lovers Charlotte Fredouille and Laetitia Girouxas  as an NGO specialising in waste management and collection in Amed, on Bali’s beautiful East coast. Among its many activities, the organisation organises awareness campaigns at schools and villages educating about waste management. The Balinese nature suffers from over-use of plastics, and locals – often poorly educated villagers (farmers and fishermen) – are not aware of the consequences of burning plastics and/or throwing these away carelessly into rivers or the ocean.

Outside cities and developed tourist areas (that represent only 10% of the island), there is often no garbage collection organised by the government. The objective of Peduli Alam therefore is to raise awareness of the results from incineration or disposal of garbage in nature. For this, Peduli Alam provides simple solutions: they build big trash bins along the coast so locals can dispose of their inorganic trash. Peduli Alam’s team then collects trash several times per month, and bring the trash to a sorting station.

Peduli Alam has collaborated with the Trash Hero Amed chapter from the very beginning in May 2015. They’re an indispensable, loyal and highly effective partner: Trash Hero Amed organises the beach clean-ups and collects rubbish with volunteers, and Peduli Alam does everything else. They supply trash bags, sticks, and gloves and, most importantly, transport the trash collected to the sorting station. Beyond that, Peduli Alam keeps part of that trash to transform it into ecobricks (see here for additional information) as well as bags made of recycled plastic.

Follow Peduli Alam here on Facebook.