The World’s Most Polluted River

Travel with us to the Citarum River in Indonesia, one of the world’s most polluted rivers.

The Citarum river snakes through West Java in Indonesia and has had an important role throughout the ages for wildlife and human habitats alike.

Today, however, the river is heavily polluted and is contaminated by a rich variety of toxins like lead, mercury, arsenic and much more.

To understand how Citarum river became one of the world’s most polluted rivers, a team of documentary filmmakers team up with international scientists to investigate.

Analyzing the water, nearby soil and the humans using the river daily, they discover how extremely toxic the river has become.

Along the way, they discover how millions of people dump their waste into the Citarum unknowledgable about the effects. To further cause harm, over 2000 different industries ruthlessly splash their waste into the river as well.

This environmentally harmful cocktail has made the waters of Citarum into a lethal mixture. Human excrement, mountains of plastic and dangerous industrial toxic waste is all that is left of a once lively paradise.

Faced with these hazardous findings, will the Indonesian government be able to turn things around? Will the industries change change their environmental standards? And what of the millions of environmentally unfriendly Indonesians?

Investigations now show the Citarum river’s water is actively being used by over 14 million Indonesias. A fact which shows how Indonesia has to take this environmental disaster very seriosly.