Zimbabwe – Kadoma City Council

Kadoma City has constructed a sanitary landfill that will house all the waste combined from the Kadoma urban area. The landfill has been designed in a way that will prevent air, land, surface water and underground water pollution. Gasses, mainly methane and carbon dioxide, are produce through anaerobic degradation of organic wastes by microbes within the waste. Management of landfill will be implemented through a network of gas collection well and pipes.

The landfill has been lined at the bottom, leachate and gas collection facilities has been put in place. A borehole was drilled for monitoring underground water. Waste recovery and recycling option will be implemented with interested stakeholders. Community based Organisations have been engaged for recycling. The area will be fenced by a perimeter fence to avoid access by unauthorized people and animals. Security will protect the site from fires caused by people and allow proper maintenance and monitoring.

Some of the projects’ objectives include constructing a compliant sanitary landfill site for proper solid waste disposal and to prevent pollution of the environment and promote a sustainable living. It also aims to prevent the spread of diseases to proper disposal of solid waste, to enhance hygienic standards through sustainable management and disposal of municipal solid waste and to enhance an aesthetic environment to the City of Kadoma.

The Partner who assisted in the construction was GIZ. It contributed financially with a total of $31802. GIZ also provided machinery for excavation and construction of machinery. The machines include dozer, excavator, font end loader, and the grader. GIZ was also working with BICHOD who was providing technical expertise. The project has reached about 100 000 direct beneficiaries.

Financial constraints and delays by contractors leading to downtime have been quite challenging. Also the processes delays project implementation and bureaucracy. Through job creation especially by creation of community based groups dealing with recycling. This will improve their life styles as this will be one of the income for their living. Jobs are created at the Landfill site. Proper disposal of waste enhance good hygiene, thereby reducing the spread of diseases. Women are the ones who usually caries the burden of taking care of the sick.

Chipo Gododo says, “With such programs, if people get employed they look after themselves properly, for example ladies may have no soap for hygiene purposes but if one get an income, we are able to clean ourselves and our environment”. Most of the workers who participated in this project were males, for examples operators. They were very interested in construction of the Landfill site and they now understand the importance of this site.

Residents allocated near the old dumpsite are very happy that they will no longer stay in a polluted environment which they use to experience for the past years. They had suffered odors, flies, smokes, rodents and dangers of snakes from the dumpsite. The will be now in less danger of contracting diseases.

The community now understands the importance of keeping their refuse on temporal storage at their homes and wait for curb side collection on collection days. There no longer dumping of waste along the side roads in the community. From the trainings done Solid waste managements the community now understands the importance of managing waste properly. Some have started segregating waste at points of generation and this will increase the life span of the landfill. The political leaders are appreciating the solid waste management groups trained by the council. They are reporting that their wards have improved so much in terms of cleanliness.

Some people now understand that solid waste management is the responsibility of both residents and council. This is evidenced by people volunteering to participate on issues to do with solid waste management in their respective wards. More than 10 groups have been formed and they are working on voluntary basis.

There is need for Monitoring and Evaluation plan. Mitigation factors on changes being faced need to be put in place. Decommission plan for the old dumpsite must be followed up. Also plan and budgets for each year must in place, and there is a need for proper operation and maintenance manuals.