♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> surabaya, indonesia's second

largest city. these red busses are a common sight, but they operate in a very unusual manner. most busses around the world charge money for a ride, but here, passengers pay their fare in a different way. with plastic >> the city government started the system in april 2018 as a way to reduce plastic waste and promote recycling.

>> the busses are just one of many ininitiatives to reduce wae in surabaya making it a green and environmentally friendly city. 20 years ago the opposite was true. the streets were overflowing with trash, protests from residents saw the closure of a landfill site resulting in vastly more waste generated than could be handled. in response, the city implemented systems to reduce garbage. the key to their approach was compost bins. everyday kitchen waste is used to create new green spaces. ♪ ♪ another initiative was the creation of 300 waste banks where recyclables can be exchanged for money. the city's initiatives have led to an annual waste reduction of

180,000 tons. ♪ >> today we discover how the indonesian city of surabaya uses waste reduction to reinvent itseself. >> surabaya is on the eastern side of the island of java. it was once a dutch colony and exported xhod is li exported commodities like sugar and tobacco to europe. today it's indonesia's largest port city with the population of 3.3 million people.

surabaya know mo ument. in japanese sudo means shark and boyo means crocodile. it is the origin of the name surabaya. the busses that take plastic bottles as payment are called suraboyo busses. there are three different routes. two were established in april 2018. the north-south line which connects the city center and the harbor and the east-west line which connect the residential east side to the schools and universities in the west. a third line established in 2019 circles the eastern side of the city. each route is around 30 kilometers long and the busses take two hours to cover the distance.

>> this is the terminal, the main bus station. at this booth, plastic bottles can be exchanged for suroboyo bus tickets. >> on weekdays, around 200 people bring bottles. on weekends, as many as 500 people come. >> the bus fare is equal to three 1.5-liter bottle, five 60 600-milliliter water cups. this man is here for the first time. he shows his identification to the staff.

they record his details and give him a special card. whenever he brings bottles, stickers are placed on the card. these allow him to ride the bus. >> suroboyo busses run from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. arriving every 15 minutes. when a passenger board, the conductor punches a hole through the sticker and then hands over the ticket showing the time of boarding and this allows

boarding for the next two hours. bottles can also be brought to the busses directly. each day between 80 and 100 kilograms of bottles are checked. they're sent to one of the city's two processing centers. the labels, caps and bottles are carefully separated. this particular center opened just a month ago, and it was swiftly built in response to a sharp rise in bottle collection.

>> this man used to be a day laborer on construction sites. the processing center offers much steadier work. the materials are sold to recycling companies. >> the money they make isn't enough to keep the busses running. so the city covers the difference. even if they're not profitable, surabaya's mayor sees a big reason to keep them going.

>> since the 1990 s, surabaya has experienced a surge in population and a similar surge in waste. there were no incineration plants, s so e erything was disposed of in two landfill sites. ♪ >> in 2001, one of these sites reached capacity, but the authorities just kept adding more. this sparked a protest movement among residences and the site was shut down. with only one landfill left, trash piled up on the streets.

the smell was unbearable. back then, the mayor was a director of the public cleanliness and parks department. >> surabaya received assistance from kyushu, an industrial city in western japan. it overcame its own problems with pollution, reinventing itself as an eco-friendly city with a rich, natural environment. today it offers its expertise to other cities across asia. in2002, kyushu dispatched a

research team to surabaya. they discovered that half of the city's garbage was food waste. ♪ ♪ >> with japan's help, surabaya developed compost bins which could easily turn waste into compost. the bins use enzymes to break down vegetable scraps, leftovers and other food waste. it takes just one week to produce ♪ ♪ >> over four years, the city distributed 16,000 of these bins for free. most went to densely populated areas called pampum which are full of low-income households. city officials gave careful

instruction says on their use and on proper garbage separation. composting reduces bad odors and it can be sold to generate income. more and more people began buying the bins and in just a few years, food waste was cut by nearly a third. ♪ >> this is one of the other ways that surabaya raises awareness of waste disposal issues. >> it's an annual contest called surabaya green and clean which started in 2005. neighborhood associations present environmental number tiffs to a jury of city workers. there are various categories including greenery, cleanliness and environmental business. local corporate sponsors award a

prize of $3,500 to each winner. >> one neighborhood association won a prize three years running. it's an alley in the center of the city with 60 people living in 17 households. >> once poor and dirty, it is now clean and green. >> the area's transformation began 15 years ago when a group of women set about cleaning the wear and plantining flowers. the city's composting project

turbo charged their efforts. in the 2016 green and clean contest, judges praised the beautiful spaces they created. the alley took firstst place in the newcomer category. the neighborhood association used the prize money to develop the alley even further. >> the residents work together to create a filtration system that turns liquid waste into

clean water. the liquid passes through ten filters including sand, stone and charcoal. ♪ >> it is then stored in tanksks below the street. ♪ >> judges at the next year's contest praised the system and the alley was awarded a second prize. this time the residents used the money to implement aquaculture. the filtered water was used to grow vegetables.

>> they also began raising and selling fish. >> in 2018 these innovations led to yet another victory in the contest. ♪ >> today, the green and clean contest is more popular than ever with over 90% of neighborhood associations taking part. >> surabaya is equipped with large composting facilities.

weeds and clippings generated frfrom maintenance on parks and roadside trees are brought here. the plant matter is ground up and then mixed with water and enzymes. after pfermenting for two weeks it becomes compost. ♪ >> there's fertilizer in public spaces and the rest is given away to city residents for free. ♪ ♪ >> since surabaya implemented its new and environmental approach it has built 370 parks and planted 75,000 trees, making the whole city a greener place.

>> trash cans can be found everywhere. waste is separated from recyclables like paper, plastic bottles and cans. in an area covering south of the city a woman can be seen taking things out of the garbage. her name is noriati. every morning as she walks towards a nearby market she collects recyclable waste.

>> noriati visits a store to buy vegetables. but that's not the only reason she's here. she's come to pick up plastic bottles. the shop staff collect them for her. >> once a week, noriati takes the recyclables to this facility. it's called a waste bank. >> the collected material is sold on to recycling companies and the money is distributed

among the bank's users. each customer has a waste bankbook. it records the type, amount and value of the recyclables. >> it's possible to receive cash upon each visit, but if you defer those payments for a year, the amount goes up by around 20%. >> noriati's haul for the day earned her $3. the first waste bank was set up in 2004 by a university professor in the city of jakarta. they have since spread to other parts of the country.

surabaya's first waste bank was set up privately in 2005, but since 2011 the city government has collaborated with neighborhood associations to set them up. this waste bank only opens on wednesday mornings. the staff are all volunteers. noriati is now a stay-at-home wife, but she used to be a math teacher. she and her husband, a teacher at an english language school have two sons. ♪

surabaya currently has around 300 waste banks with 15,000 combined users. every week they turn over seven tons of recyclable trash. creating new products from garbage and then selling it on has also become a popular activity. this is a recycle shop. it was founded in 2007 by a group of five local women. >> most of the products are made using waste from local households. >> this is therese, the manager

of the shop. >> everyone's working on the shop's most popular product. a dress.

>> at first, the shop was just an extension of the hobby and their aim was just to make a little extra cash. but in 2011 their dresses won a prize at an ecocontest. orders flooded in from people who wanted to wear them at festivals and other events. the garments cost between $25 and $500. sometimes they sell as many as

ten. the shop also rents them out. >> this is the final disposal site for surabaya's garbage. every day it's visited by 230 six-ton garbage trucks. the city government estimates that a quarter of surabaya's garbage output is now recycled.

♪ the site contains a facility that makes use of the trash one last time. ♪ >> it's an electricity generator powered with methane gas produced by the ♪ ♪ >> every day it generates 1600 kilowatts, supplying electricity to nearby homes. extracting methane also shrinks the volume of the garbage, freeing up space. another initiative is a large-scale incineration plant which is due to be completed in december 2019. incineration will vastly reduce the amount of garbage at the disposal site. ♪ ♪

>> today, preschool children are riding a surabaya bus as part of an education april. ♪ ♪p. ♪ ♪r. ♪ ♪o. ♪ ♪g. ♪ ♪r. ♪ ♪a. ♪ ♪m. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

surabaya is working hard to up prove its waste disposal measures even further. their

>> hello. i'm annette young. welcome back to the news room. italy is coming further out of lockdown today with spain already on its way. it's a week before frfrance followows suit and b begins th process o of ending confinement. this as s all three european countries registered their lowest daily death tolls for weeks. >> i hope peoeople will have common senense a and understandt even if we can move around, we still have to be cautious and we must act in a responsible way. i think that everything should slowlyly