Zimbabwe – Reducing effects of Solid Waste through proper waste disposal

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.

This project aims to construct a compliant sanitary landfill site for proper solid waste disposal. It sets out to prevent pollution of the environment and promote a sustainable living and prevent the spread of diseases to proper disposal of solid waste. It also opts to enhance hygienic standards through sustainable management and disposal of municipal solid waste and enhance an aesthetic environment to the City of Kadoma.

Of the direct beneficiaries, 100000 participants have been reached. The government has allocated $49515 to this project.

Of the main challenges, financial constraints came on top. There were hardly enough funds to support this project. Delays by contractors leading to downtime. The contractors did not do things on time and that delayed every other process going forward.

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. There is job creation 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.

“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”, says Chipo Gogodo who is a Farmer. 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 odours, flies, smokes, rodents and dangers of snakes from the dumpsite. They 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 are no longer dumping of waste along the side roads in the community. From the trainings done on 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.

Going forward, there is a need for Monitoring and Evaluation plan to track the development of the project. Mitigation factors on changes being faced need to be put in place. Also, plan and budgets for each year must in place.