For many tourists, Bali conjures up images of white sandy beaches, crystal clear waters, expansive rice fields and lush, dense jungles – but the reality in many areas is very different.
The popular island has long suffered from a rubbish crisis, with waste washing up along the tourist hotspot beaches of Kuta, Seminyak, Legian and Jimbaran from the months of October to March.
It’s an annual phenomenon that sees plastic, garbage, and waste from shipping vessels often carried into land by strong winds, high tides, and driving rains.
The island’s open landfills are also a huge problem. As they become fuller, they put pressure on local waste management operations.
Rubbish is then tipped into waterways and dumped in unofficial landfill sites, often on the edges of some of Bali’s most beautiful natural landscapes.
Officials have implemented solutions, and while some have had an impact, others have fallen flat.
However, what some may not know is that over the past two years, beach cleaning robots have been tested in some of island’s top resorts by major hotel brands.
Now, local leaders are sharing their hopes that these high tech hoovers could help change the way in which the island’s most popular beaches are maintained.
Alit Sucipta, the Deputy Regent of Badung, visited the tourist hotspot, FINNS Beach Club in Canggu to formally launch the deployment of the BeBot Smart Beach Cleaning Robot.
The robot, valued at around $65,000 USD, has been a resident of the beach club for three months, but on Tuesday, local leaders came together to discuss the future of beach management in Bali’s busiest tourism resort.
“If you look at what we’ve seen, this is a reference point that we need to study,” Deputy Regent Sucipta told reporters, as per The Bali Sun.
“This robot can be used, but with an even larger capacity, so we can provide it to each traditional village in coastal areas.”
He explained while they see potential in it, the robot isn’t yet able to maximize its performance.
“Perhaps in the future we can use the same robot machine but with a larger capacity so it can collect other types of waste,” he added.
He hopes other businesses will follow suit and invest in similar technologies to combat the island’s waste problem.
According to The Bali Sun, the solar-powered robot has been working 2.5 hours a day, and has been able to clear 180 meter stretches of Berawa Beach and Perancak Beach.
“Since this step began, we have succeeded in reducing the waste disposed of in landfills from 80 percent to 20 percent based on last year’s audit,” Director of PT Pantai Semara Nusantara (FINNS Beach Club), Wayan Asrama said.
“But it’s not finished there, by the end of 2025, our target is for only 5 percent of waste to be entering landfill.”
It comes as Bali Provincial Government confirmed the Suwung TPA, Bali’s largest open landfill, is officially closed.
Environmental NGOs like Mudfish No Plastic and Sungai Watch have also gone to great lengths to tackle illegal landfills and beach plastic, as well as creating new systems to recycle and repurpose inorganic waste.
Gary Bencheghib, a French filmmaker living in Indonesia, is part of Sungai Watch, a team dedicated to “protecting waterways in Indonesia”.
The not-for-profit organization revealed 1,053,270kg of waste was collected in 2024, 503 clean-ups organized and 104 trash barriers installed.
“This brings our total collection to 2,796,360kg of waste, 1,628 total clean-ups organized, and 330 barriers installed since we started cleaning rivers 4 years ago, in 2020,” they said in an Instagram post.
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