CEO GP Russ Chaney headlined a contingent of IAPMO senior executives who traveled to Indonesia to celebrate World Plumbing Day at events March 10 and 11.
Chaney was accompanied by Ken Wijaya, senior director of IAPMO R&T Lab; Shirley Dewi, director of Quality Assurance and Management Systems Registration Services for IAPMO R&T; Megan Lehtonen, vice president of International Business Development for IAPMO; and staff members from IAPMO’s Jakarta office. The U.S. Embassy in Jakarta was also well represented, as Acting Ambassador Kristen Bauer attended the March 10 event; Commercial Officer Margaret Shu Teasdale was on hand for both days’ events; and David Gossack, senior commercial officer and commercial counselor, attended the March 11 festivities.
On March 10, IAPMO hosted an educational presentation for more than 80 children at Yayasan Rahmatan Lil-Amin Jakarta Timur, an orphanage in Jakarta, to teach them about how proper plumbing ensures people have access to clean and safe water and sanitation. A PowerPoint presentation taught the children about the importance of water and how more than 1 billion people around the world do not have access to drinkable water, 2.6 billion do not have proper toilets, and how dirty water is blamed for more than 3 million children’s deaths each year. Dewi said the children were very responsive to the presentation, and the children even surprised them by writing and performing a song about how important it is not to waste water.
“The song they wrote and performed defining the importance of water was something we didn’t expect coming into the event,” she said. “They greeted us warmly and we were very touched by it.”
On March 11 – World Plumbing Day – IAPMO and Badan Standardisasi Nasional (BSN), Indonesia’s national standardization agency, co-hosted an industry and media event to bring awareness about World Plumbing Day and their joint efforts to develop, implement and enforce an Indonesian National Standard (SNI) for plumbing systems through the adoption of the Uniform Plumbing Code (UPC®).
“For well over a decade, IAPMO has had the benefit of working with BSN to develop a national standard based on IAPMO’s flagship, the UPC,” Chaney said. “We were thrilled to have the acting ambassador, as well as David Gossack, on hand to support IAPMO’s effort.”
More than 150 people came out for the event, which was covered by Indonesian television and other media, and industry professionals and representatives from various Indonesian ministries participated in a question-and-answer session at the end.
Wijaya said he has been very appreciative of the support and cooperation IAPMO has received from BSN during the development process, and the event drove home how important having mandatory standards is for those involved in plumbing and sanitation in Indonesia.
“This event gave me a firsthand look at how much industry and manufacturers want the standards outlined in the SNI to be mandatory,” he said. “I hope the ministries take that step to make it part of the system.”
Last modified: March 17, 2014