Indonesia named as a market for improving informal waste workers' lives

Indonesia has been named the second implementation market for a global initiative to improve the lives of informal waste sector workers. It is a reminder that much of the country's recycling already runs through collectors, sorters, and small aggregators who work outside formal systems, often without safety, security, or recognition.

The people behind the numbers

Recovery rates rarely mention the workers who make them possible. Yet in many Indonesian cities, the material that gets recycled does so because informal collectors move it, sort it, and sell it on. Any credible circular economy plan has to account for this sector, both as a matter of fairness and because those networks are where a large share of materials are actually recovered today.

Support that improves incomes, safety, and standing strengthens the whole chain rather than competing with it. Integration, not displacement, is usually the smarter path, because a formal system that ignores existing collectors tends to be more expensive and less effective than one that builds on them.

Why it matters

For government and utilities, the lesson is practical. Data on who collects what, and where, is often held by the informal sector, and recognising that knowledge makes planning better. Sirkularium reads this initiative as a useful correction to a common blind spot. Circular systems are built by people, not only by policy and plants, and the plans that last are the ones that design for the workers already doing the job.