I still remember my first meeting with Yuyun in Bali in 2000 during my search for a Balinese partner for BORDA`s SANIMAS (“sanitation by communities”) project, that was funded by AusAID through WSP-EAP. Yuyun was recommended to me by a good friend of mine, Paul Boon, then Country Director of the Belgian NGO, FADO.
Yuyun had told me about her move to Bali, with her family some years earlier, to escape the growing pollution and stress in Jakarta. She had moved so that she could raise her two daughters in Bali’s healthier environment. As a graduate of the prestigious Bandung University of Engineering, she was one of the first women to become an environmental engineer in Indonesia.
Her outgoing attitude made it easy to become a volunteer editor of a Balinese journal shortly after her arrival in Bali during the mid-90s. Her professional interest in waste management led her to initiate a number of campaigns to clean up Bali, especially the beaches. Evolving into an eco-social activist, Yuyun became increasingly aware of the limitations of public and private services that were unable to cope with the ever increasing amounts of domestic wastewater and solid waste. Awareness campaigns led by Yuyun and Bali Fokus aimed at empowering waste pickers and motiving households to practise the 3 Rs of waste management - Reduce, Re-use, Re-cycle.
Since 2000, the Indonesian, regional and global BORDA partner-network have valued greatly Yuyun’s inputs, especially in the field of solid waste management and clean development mechanisms (CDM). We hope to continue our special partnership and are very proud of Yuyun’s achievements.
Andreas Ulrich, Director, BORDA
