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The field of sanitation, hygiene and health management may not be the world’s sexiest, but as head of a neighborhood unit in North Petojo, Central Jakarta, Irwansyah has made a career out of it. It’s a job that the 44-year-old says is as far-removed as possible from his educational background in computer management.

“I don’t know why I decided to work on environmental issues or what inspired me, but I enjoy it,” he says. “It’s a whole different world to computers.”

But a world no less fulfilling, he points out. Irwansyah has rubbed shoulders with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, discussed drainage and sewage with the mayor of Central Jakarta and taken US Sectary of State Hillary Clinton on a tour of North Petojo’s communal toilet facilities during her visit in February 2009.

For Irwansyah, the journey to becoming an environmentalist was more about helping his community than anything else.

“Helping my neighborhood has always been something I hold onto, an ideal, and it has been a great and rewarding experience to help and educate the people about health,” he says.

Last year, Irwansyah received the country’s highest acknowledgement for environmental work, the Kalpataru, an award given by the State Ministry for the Environment to people who have dedicated their lives to environmental issues.

“Receiving the award of course was the highest honor I could receive. It gives me a lot of pride and makes me proud that the government appreciates my work,” Irwansyah says.

But despite the hype and prominence that goes with receiving such a distinction, Irwansyah says his feet are firmly planted on the ground.

“Yes, it was an honor, but I am more concerned about continuing to try to change the behavior of people; changing their behavior from having bad habits to ‘half-good’ habits,” he says. “I use the phrase ‘half-good’ because there are still a lot of issues that need attention and need to be worked on. We still have a lot to improve on sanitation and hygiene.”

Poor sanitation causes at least 120 million cases of disease and 50,000 premature deaths in the country every year, according to the World Bank. Diarrhea-related diseases are the most common, with 89 million cases nationwide annually, followed by skin disorders and trachoma, a contagious bacterial conjunctivitis that can lead to blindness.

As a neighborhood head, Irwansyah oversees a number of green activities in North Petojo, a riverside slum of 3,321 people.
These include sanitation improvement training projects, the quarterly cleaning of the Krukut River and health programs for pregnant women and children under 5.

While the neighborhood has received a number of green awards, it is most recognized for a pilot sanitation system project, which includes special toilet facilities that use buffer reactivity to turn feces into usable biogas.

Buffer reactivity technology has been used to reduce the amount of domestic and industrial waste entering the city’s waterways and improve overall water quality in Jakarta’s rivers.

“By having buffer reactors, we can turn domestic waste from toilets into fuel for the community kitchen and use the chambers within the reactors to treat wastewater for E coli bacteria or other dangerous bugs before it goes into the river,” Irwansyah says. “This will help to improve sanitation and stop the spread of disease.”

The concept and technology is not only innovative, it has proven to be a hit with the local community. Irwansyah attributes this to motivating the community to not only get behind the project, but also to participate in building the infrastructure for the system.

He says he hopes this model of community motivation will be adopted and applied in other areas of Indonesia and Asia.

“The important thing is that there needs to be a motivator and the people in the community must be willing to make that change,” he says. “Poor sanitation and hygiene are caused by habits that are passed down from generation to generation. So unless people are willing to change, it will be hard for us to make them change.”

This new approach even caught Clinton’s attention.

“I got a call from the US Embassy in Jakarta telling me that this big-shot American would be coming, but they didn’t say who,” he says. “I told them it must be Hillary Clinton. The embassy staff were shocked. I told them I saw on Metro TV that she was coming to Indonesia.”

For his next act, Irwansyah says he hopes North Petojo will play host to US President Barack Obama if and when he makes his oft-delayed state visit to Indonesia. Now that he is used to rubbing shoulders with politicians, Irwansyah will be more than ready to talk sewers and toilets with him.