Foreign firm to help city manage garbage

Uncollected garbage in Kawangware on August 12, 2015. PHOTO | ANTHONY OMUYA |

What you need to know:

  • Kidero admits challenges in disposing waste.
  • Company will teach officials effective waste disposal and recycling methods.

City Hall has invited a foreign company to help the county government in managing waste disposal.

This is after admitting that collecting garbage and disposing it had become a big challenge.

There have been heaps of uncollected garbage in most parts of Nairobi over what the Governor, Dr Evans Kidero, attributed to a drastic increase in the population generating more and more waste.

Therefore, a request by Hong Kong-based company, Mezzo Holdings Ltd, to share with City Hall in their experience in waste management was welcomed by Dr Kidero.

“We have a very good method of solid waste management in Fakuoka State in Japan which we hope to apply and teach in Nairobi County,” the company’s group director, Mr Shreshta G.P said.

He was among other investors who had visited the governor last week.

The firm has been developing a solid waste recycling management framework making garbage collection more sustainable and environmental friendly in different countries in the world.

MORE GARBAGE

In Fakuoka, solid waste is usually recycled to make different products although Mr Shreshta did not say what kind of recycling plant his company intends to put up at the Dandora dumpsite.

Nairobi, Dr Kidero said, generates about 2,400 tonnes of solid waste per day stating that the increased population had led to more garbage.

“The city has a projected population of more than five million by the year 2030 up from the three million recorded during the 2009 census, every person produces half a kilogramme of solid waste in a day,” he told the group of investors who had visited him at his office in City Hall.

And with the increase in population, the city he said, has to get ahead in establishing how to manage the accumulating solid waste.

Already, Dandora dumpsite is full and plans to relocate it to a new site in Ruai has been put on hold.

This is after experts warned that the proposed new site would affect the aviation industry since birds attracted to the dumpsite may hinder planes flying to and from Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

The county government has been announcing that they would engage a private developer to put up a waste management plant in Dandora.

HEALTH THREAT

Recently, Prof Shem Wandiga, a scientist and lecturer at the University of Nairobi’s Department of Chemistry, warned of increased air pollution in Nairobi if the Dandora dumpsite is not closed down.

He said it had reached its maximum life of 14 years and has now become a major health threat to residents.

Prof Wandiga asked Nairobi Governor, Dr Evans Kidero, to step in and look for an alternative site.

In December last year, a group of Nairobi residents moved to court to push the county government to relocate the dumpsite, which they blamed for increased cases of respiratory diseases.