Manila to collect hair, chicken feathers for Guimaras oil spill cleanup

The city government of Manila would collect hair from barber shops and beauty salons and chicken feathers from markets as its way of contributing to the cleanup of the oil spill in Guimaras.

Manila’s Inner City Development chairman Arnold "Ali" Atienza said the collected hair and chicken feathers would be turned over to the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG).

This project is in response to President Arroyo’s declaration that the oil spill is now a national calamity and the Manila city government is willing to do its share to help contain the oil spill.

"I will instruct the Bureau of Permits and License Office of the Manila City Hall to issue a memorandum to all barber shops and beauty parlors in the city not to dispose cut hair. The Bureau of Permits has the list of these beauty establishments. The hair will be collected from the shops, brought to the nearest public market and forwarded to the PCG," said Atienza.

He said he would also order the market administrators in the different public markets in the city to gather chicken feathers.

"Let us see how much we could collect in a week’s time," he said.

Human hair and chicken’s feathers, which are often ignored and immediately discarded, would be used to contain the two-week old environmental disaster in Western Visayas.

Atienza also hopes that other local government units will follow their example and start their own collection drive.

The PCG has also been circulating a text message to rally the people to the same cause. They have designated their office in South Harbor and in Iloilo as drop off centers.

Greenpeace International earlier said that apart from human hair, indigenous materials such as cogon and rice straw could also act as absorbents of oil.

In the afternoon of Aug. 11, the MT Solar 1, which was reportedly carrying 2.1 million liters of bunker fuel, sank off Guimaras Island. Over 200,000 liters of oil have been spilled into Guimaras waters.