Bonaire residents demand Dutch government intervention after another landfill fire
Residents of Bonaire are calling on the Dutch government in The Hague to take immediate action after a landfill on the island caught fire for the second time in a week, ED reports. Residents blame years of inadequate waste management and slow progress on long-discussed solutions.
Pro Lagun, a local residents' organization, asserted that the island administration alone cannot handle the growing crisis. Jan Verbeek of Pro Lagun asserted that a village like Bonaire cannot handle this alone. "We would have taken action long ago if such an incident occurred on one of the Wadden Islands."
Proposed emergency measures include temporarily shipping waste to the Netherlands for sorting and processing. Verbeek acknowledged the cost and logistical complexity but said, “No one wants unsorted waste. But desperate times call for desperate measures.” Residents also want source-separated waste, including organic and construction debris.
Clark Abraham, responsible for environment and waste management, said the administration is working on waste separation, sorting, and new processing methods, potentially off-island or regionally, with a goal of ending landfilling by 2028. “As long as we continue to dump waste, incidents like this will occur,” Abraham said. “Fires happen in every landfill in the world.”
Residents argue that safety risks justify more immediate measures. “If the landfill cannot close, residents must be relocated,” Verbeek said, citing a ruling from the Netherlands’ Human Rights Council that identified unsafe living conditions near the site.
