Municipalities are under pressure to divert waste from landfill as required by the National Environmental Management: Waste Act (NEM:WA, Act 59 of 2008).

The implementation of alternative waste management thus far has been largely on an ad hoc basis. This comes as a result of the challenges associated with, among others, high cost, and limited capacity to evaluate the technical feasibility and financial viability of waste related projects.

NEM:WA (59 of 2008) and the National Waste Management Strategy (NWMS, 2011) both require municipalities to develop Integrated Waste Management Plans (IWMPs).

These should be developed in line with other municipal, provincial and national plans and strategies. However, many of the IWMPs still lack technical and financial substance, providing limited guidance in terms of both future infrastructural and operational requirements.

This paper outlines the development of a decision support tool aimed at assisting municipal waste departments in the Western Cape to adopt a systems-based approach for the implementation of integrated waste management.

Download technical paper here.