5 Years of River Cleanup: San Miguel Removes 8.5 M Tons of Waste

Better Rivers PH, San Miguel Corporation’s initiative to clean up river systems in Luzon, marked its fifth year last month with great strides in reducing river pollution and mitigating floods.

San Miguel Corporation (SMC) recently marked five years of cleaning up major rivers and river systems — a continuing effort that has, as of end-June, removed around 8.5 million metric tons of silt and solid waste from 10 key waterways in and around Metro Manila.​

Launched in 2020, the initiative, dubbed Better Rivers PH, aims to reduce river pollution and help prevent flooding by restoring and dredging rivers and improving their flow.

According to SMC Chairman and CEO Ramon S. Ang, the company has already cleared over 161 kilometers of river channels, and the work is far from over.

The waste and silt — removed from the Tullahan, Pasig, and San Juan Rivers; rivers in Bulacan and Pampanga; the San Isidro, Biñan, and Tunasan Rivers in Laguna, and waterways in Navotas and Parañaque—have significantly increased the carrying capacity of these river systems.

This has helped lessen the risk of severe flooding in surrounding communities, by enabling floodwaters to be drained to Manila Bay more effectively. Without this intervention, many of these waterways, made shallow by years of silt and debris buildup, would frequently overflow and inundate communities, Ang said.

The effort has also reduced foul odors coming from rivers and, in some cases, encouraged the return of fish, owing to the removal of decomposing waste and garbage from the river beds.

“Because of many contributing and aggravating factors, flooding continues to be a major risk for many of our cities and provinces. For San Miguel, we cannot afford to just stand by and do nothing because in the end, our economy and all of us, suffer. That’s why we’ve been working non-stop these last five years to help clean and restore our rivers,” Ang said.

“Through cooperation with the national and local governments and other stakeholders, we’ve now managed to increase the carrying capacities of our major rivers. But a lot still needs to be done, including in changing mindsets and discouraging the throwing of wastes in our waterways. We are committed to continue working with stakeholders and doing our part every way we can,” he added.

SMC’s river cleanup initiative, which does year-round work at targeted rivers, is part of its broader social responsibility agenda, and is aligned with SMC’s major sustainability initiatives, which includes a drive towards addressing critical water issues.

Fully-funded and undertaken by SMC, the program comes at no cost to government and taxpayers, and is done in close coordination with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and local government units.

From its early efforts to clean up the Tullahan, Pasig, and San Juan Rivers, SMC’s river cleanup initiative has extended northwards to Bulacan and Pampanga, and the south, to rivers in Paranaque and Laguna.

Last June, it completed the cleanup of Tunasan River in Laguna, where it removed 53,774 tons of silt and wastes.

This is on top of its earlier efforts to clean up the Binan River (87,899 tons removed) and San Isidro River in San Pedro (417,044 tons removed). The company is set start cleaning up two more rivers in the province.