Kajiado North grappling with solid waste problem

By Michael Mwangi

A stakeholders workshop convened jointly by UN- Habitat and the Government of Kenya a while back validated findings of the environmental and social impact assessment of commissioning the and new Kajiado Integrated Sustainable Waste Management (KISWAM) facility through Italian government soft loan funding.

Key stakeholders in the project included the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation, the Politecnico di Milano (POLIMI) and the County Government of Kajiado. .

The proposed recycling facility – KISWAM, is a resource recovery system in which organic matter - constituting over 60 percent of waste - is used to generate biogas and electricity, and valuable resources recovered through recycling and re-use of waste.

A rooftop solar photovoltaic system will generate electricity to operate the facility. Ensuring that the project is socially acceptable, environmentally friendly and economically viable were key considerations in the selection of technologies for the waste-to-energy facility.

The recommended technology is a combination of bio-dryer and bio-reactor units, a more flexible and affordable solution than other options considered. The robust, labour- intensive technology was expected to create 200 new jobs.

The delay in the implementaton of the project is raising fears that it may not take off although the county government has insisted the plans are still on. There are calls from various stakeholders for citizens

to manage their waste from the source inorder to redece amount of waste going to the dumpsite. Elveza media is currently doing a campaign to turn Oloolua Ward into the cleanest Ward in the country within the next 90 days. The campaign which started on November 21 has seen the Elveza team visiting over 50 households within Oloolua sub location. The campaign is poised to continue to other areas in Kajiado North.

The strategy being used by Elveza team on the ground involves knocking at people’s doors, and asking how they manage their waste, challenges they face and their recommendations on what can be done to improve the management of solid waste.

Some of the reasons given by landlords on why they are not able to manage their solid waste includes lack of awareness by the government, failure by the government to implement garbage collection services high cost of private garbage collectors

and tenants who throw waste carelessly. In its pursuit Elveza data estimates a whooping 90% of the properties toured so far throw their waste in a pit. They then burn the waste which in some cases is not possible since they also pour kitchen and washing liquid waste in the same pit. Out of the 90% households that use a waste pit to manage their waste, half of them burn their diapers with the other half either throwing them outside their compound in public and private spaces such as fields, footpaths and secluded roads.

Some landlords also complained that some tenants throw used diapers in latrines causing the latrines to fill up quickly creating a liquid waste crisis. Meanwhile, the reasons given by tenants who confessed to throwing diapers into latrines include lack of bins within their rented premises and also cultural beliefs such as witchcraft.