Envt: Cities, municipalities get trucks to address waste menace

Mr Sam Atul, the mayor of Lira city receives two garbage trucks in Kampala. Photo taken by Tonny Abet in November 2021

Envt: Cities, municipalities get trucks to address waste menace

BY TONNY ABET

The Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development yesterday gave cities and municipalities, garbage trucks to address the piles of rotten, unsightly and hazardous wastes that are rampant in urban areas countrywide.

Dr Sam Mayanja, the State Minister for Lands said a total of fourteen brand new trucks were given to five cities, each receiving two trucks, and four municipalities received one truck each.

Arua, Lira, Hoima, Mbale, Masaka were the cities that benefitted while the municipalities included Kitgum, Mubende, Tororo and Kasese. More cities and municipalities will follow, according to the State Minister.

“Currently, the quantity of wastes generated in all our cities and municipalities in Uganda exceeds their capacity to collect, transport and dispose it off,” he said.

He added: “This results in mountains of wastes that are a common sight in our urban areas. This poses a threat to our health and also creates scenes that make our urban areas unsightly.”

The country’s efficiency in solid waste collection is currently very low, at 30 percent. This means the biggest chunk of waste cannot be collected and a huge portion are ending up in water bodies, thereby polluting and affecting vital aquatic life like fish.

“The limited capacity to manage solid waste has resulted in many of our people using unconventional methods of disposal such as collection within the backyards and burning, collection in polythene bags and dumping in streams, roadsides and water drainage channels which leads to blockage of the channels and streams,” Dr Mayanja said.

The blockage of drainage channels has caused flooding and loss of lives, especially in Kampala, according to previous media reports.

The country is also experiencing rapid urbanisation at a rate of 5 per cent, a factor which is leading to overcrowding and emergence of slums and informal settlements which have poor garbage management strategies, according to the Ministry.  

Mayors, Ministry divided on polythene ban

Mr Sam Atul, the Mayor for Lira city and Ms Florence Namayanja, the Masaka city mayor, applauded the Ministry for the trucks but asked the government to implement the ban on polythene bags.

They said polythene is one of the root causes of the growing problem of solid wastes in urban areas which are very costly to manage.

Mr Atul said: “We have received trucks to support us on garbage management, most especially in this era when the city is growing and attracting many people, the challenges of waste management are real.”

“But we also need government to come clear on helping us to manage polythene bags. The State Minister of Environment [Ms Beatrice Anywar] has come out to say that we are going to have a ban on kaveera but action has not yet been taken. This still remains a challenge for us as a city and the whole country,” he added.

Ms Namayanja said that although the biggest source of waste is from agricultural commodities sold in the city, “plastics such as the bottles and kavera are the hardest to handle.”

“Government has made a pronouncement on the ban and there is a law banning kavera. Kavera comes from known manufacturing sites and if they [government] do not deal with it from the source, it becomes a lot problem for us and the environment because we are at the receiving end,” she said.

But Dr Mayanja said the government cannot ban kavera. “Polythene bags are produced everywhere in the world. The right thing is not to ban it but find the good way of handling,” he said.