Bali’s Big New Year Clean-Up Underway At Top Tourist Destinations

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New Year’s celebrations went off with a bang in Bali. With hundreds of thousands of tourists letting loose and parties spreading across beaches, venues, streets, and private homes, a big clean-up operation is underway. 

Bali’s busiest beaches of Kuta, Legian, and Seminyak welcome tens of thousands of people to the shorelines to watch an incredible fireworks display when the clock struck midnight on the 1st of January 2024.

These New Year’s celebrations all went according to plan, though officials have confirmed that over 20 tonnes of trash were left across the beachfront.

While it is common for tides of plastic waste to wash up on the shore of Bali’s popular beaches this time of year, the vast majority of this trash was left behind by partygoers. 

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The Badung Regency Environment and Hygiene Service (DLHK) team has cleaned up at least 20 tons of rubbish on Seminyak, Legian, and Kuta beaches.

The stretch of coastline, also known as the Samigita Beaches, was one of the busiest spots on the island on New Year’s Eve.

Speaking to reports the Badung DLHK Marine Debris Detection and Evacuation Coordinator, Made Gede Dwipayana, thanks the team for their tireless efforts over the last 24 hours.

He told reporters, “At approximately 09.00 WITA, the Samigita Beach area was clean. The total amount of rubbish at Samigita Beach is 10 trucks or 20 tonnes of rubbish.”

The clean-up team was also supported by 15 more workers who were sponsored by Coke-Cola to help with the trash-collecting mission. 

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Dwipayana noted that the lack of ocean trash had made the job easier than in previous years.

He explained, “Fortunately, there is currently zero beach trash, whereas last year, there was a lot of beach trash. Now there is no beach rubbish. In the past there was a lot of beach rubbish mixed in, there was also a lot of New Year’s celebration rubbish, maybe it could have reached hundreds of tonnes last year.”

Nevertheless, Dwipanya and his teams are not going to take a rest just yet. They will be on call throughout the rainy season in case the tides of ocean plastic do land on Bali’s shores.

He noted, “We will remain on standby, especially heavy equipment, to continue patrolling there to anticipate waste from the wet season.”

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“We hope that this year Badung officers will be solid in dealing with cleaning tasks in Badung because this is their routine task, so they are expected to be ready to accept whatever consequences they may have.”

Moving forward, however, teams in charge of Kuta Beach, Legian Beach, and Seminyak Beach want to see more done to ensure the island’s top destinations remain clean and tidy for tourists.

One key strategy is to work with traders on the beachfront to help prevent the creation of trash at the source.

With more traders due to set up shopfronts in the area in 2024, officials want to work with business owners to reduce the amount of waste-generating goods on sale in the area. 

The Chairman of the Kuta Beach Task Force, Wayan Sirna, told reporters that simple fixes would make a big difference to tourists, locals and traders.

He noted that for example “Some types of waste is visitor waste such as coconut shells. Because the traders predominantly sell young coconuts. We have suggested putting the shells in plastic bags and just transporting them.”

Bali’s Acting Governor Sang Made Mahendra Jaya has confirmed that when the new tourism tax is introduced on the 14th of February 2024 that 50-70% of funds generated will be spent on tackling the island’s waste management issues that have caught the attention of almost all Bali tourists in one way or another during their time on the island.