THE highlighting of Miri’s polluted beaches by delegates of the three-day inaugural National Hornbill Conference held in the city early this week stole the thunder from what took place at the conference.
There were many red-faces among the hosts when delegates of the conference from outside the state recoiled with horror and disgust at the sight of miles and miles of rubbish, tree branches and sawdust instead of white silver sand along the beach.
They were brought to the beach which fronts the Piasau nature reserve where the celebrated hornbills Juliet and Faridah live as part of the post-conference tour.
It is not clear if the walk along the beach was to show off a tourism attraction of the touted Resort City of the state, or the contamination of what was once white sandy beach.
Whatever the purpose was, it exposed an environmental shame that has long been swept under the carpet by the authorities.
To be fair to the present city council and other environmental agencies, the sawmill debris and other flotsam and jetsam that mar this once beautiful beach is a culmination of years of neglect, and not a recent phenomenon that they failed to prevent.
We should also note that Miri beaches are not the only ones in the state spoiled by rubbish and debris.
In fact the beaches along the state’s whole coastline except for small stretches are marred by debris and rubbish discarded into our rivers.
Apart from periodic beach cleaning campaigns organised by the city council, corporate bodies and NGOs, nothing much has been done to tackle the problem.
Beach cleaning campaigns although commendable only clear a small stretch of the beach for a week, before the tides wash up another load of rubbish turning the beach into an eyesore again.
They are like giving painkillers to a patient with serious illness to give temporary relief, but not cure the disease.
What is needed is a sustained and concerted programme involving every level of the society and the government to stop the pollution at source besides physically removing the debris from the beaches.
First of all there must be a political will to take this environmental ‘bull’ by the horns and there must be a realisation that it would be a long uphill task as the key to this problem is changing the mindset of the people towards protecting the environment.
Everybody knows that changing the attitude of the people towards keeping the environment clean starts from the schools, but we just do not have the will to initiate that change.
There had been some projects to involve students in environmental conservation but these were poorly implemented and not sustained.
Following this embarrassing exposure of dirty beaches perhaps Miri City Council could organise a conference on involving schools in protecting the environment and come up with a blueprint to implement a sustained campaign to inculcate environmental awareness among students.
It will take years for the campaign to bear fruits, so in the meantime more immediate measures must be taken to address the situation.
One of these is to wield the big stick on the polluters through more stringent enforcement of the laws on pollution.
It is too much to hope that our beaches would be clean up soon, but a start must be made somewhere.
The old cliché says: “A journey of a thousand miles starts with the first step.”
Well, we have over a thousand of miles of beaches to clean so there is no time to delay that journey.