August 10, 2011

The proposed new waste management by-laws are a step in the right direction in terms of ensuring that residents separate their own waste.  But to be effective, it needs to go further than just waste separation and incorporate a sustainable economic model.

Whilst sorting at source is key, a financial model making compliance viable needs to be investigated.  The success of waste management is governed by the appropriate pricing of waste removal services supported by a hundred percent buy-in from communities.

Director of waste management company, TEDCOR (The Enterprise Development Corporation) Gavin Glick says that the success of  sustainable waste management lies in reducing the amount of waste that ends up in landfills. “There are presently, over 1200 such sites in the country all of which are reaching their capacity.  Reducing the amount of waste that goes into these sites can be achieved by efficient recycling.  Of course, sorting at source is incumbent on communities taking responsibility for recycling their waste.  It should therefore be driven by social and environmental responsibility rather than legislation. One way of achieving this would be to roll out extensive awareness campaigns to educate and encourage people to participate in recycling.” he says.

To date Tedcor has 120 highly trained, waste management community contractors who, with the help of the company, now own their trucks.  Today, each contractor employs at least 12 people who service between 6000 to 7500 community households.  Many have completed their tender contracts and have gone on to set up further SME’s.  By linking local residents and emerging contractors looking to start their own enterprises, with municipalities that award large-scale waste management tenders, a proven model has been established.

“The key here is to ensure that collectors are motivated by being adequately rewarded for their efforts and can see the value in processing waste.   The stumbling block lies, of course, with many cities in South Africa that are located some distance from recycling stations making it logistically difficult to access - so waste ends up in landfill sites,” he says.

Correct pricing of services rendered should incentivise collectors to find alternatives to landfills for the waste that they deliver.  At present, the going rate of R23 a ton, is simply not economical or viable and in fact encourages landfill dumping.   Illegal dumping is an ongoing challenge and could be remedied with the introduction of financial incentives.  If certain components were prohibited from landfills, such as wood, for example, collectors would quickly find other commercially viable uses.  So the law has to be viewed holistically, and not limited to collection.

Glick, who has recently returned from a fact-finding trip to Brazil says that the waste management sector employs over a million recyclable waste collectors.  Residents sort their own refuse of which 20 percent goes to landfills and the balance is collected by specialist mini businesses or co-ops.  A recent Brazilian survey shows that residents participate in the programme not necessarily because of the environmental impact but more because of community camaraderie. “It’s frowned upon not to recycle waste,” he says.

Every district has their own co-ops, which are self-funded. Their function is to collect the separated recyclables from households,using carts, similar to what we have in South Africa.  The system works. Collection is efficient, sustainable and at zero cost to the householder and at no cost to government. Critical to the success is volume. There has to be buy-in from the community and if everyone complies, there’s enough volume to support these entities. After further sorting by the co-ops refuse is sold to the secondary market. By generating huge volumes, recycling plants are built to cope with the demand.