The City of Cape Town has diverted close to a quarter of its waste from landfill during the 2016/17 period.

According to the municipality its waste minimisation efforts have helped to increase the percentage of waste diverted away from landfill from 12.3% in 2011/12 to 21.3% by 2016/2017.

Looking to the current financial year the City has set aside approximately R118.7 million for waste minimisation initiatives, which include recycling and composting.

“One of the City’s aims is to be a world-class, clean and resource-efficient city which protects its natural environment and enables a more prosperous future. As such, a number of interventions are in place to reduce illegally dumped waste and also to divert as much waste as possible from landfill sites,” the City highlighted in a statement.

Waste diversion interventions

Some of these interventions include the recent opening of two waste drop-off sites which are expected to help contribute to reducing the occurrence of illegally dumped waste as well as improving waste diversion from landfill.

The new drop-off sites brings the total number of City-operated drop-offs to 24, each within a 7 km radius of the next, with this distance reducing as more drop-offs are added.

The municipality is also carrying out various studies on suitable models for further roll-out of recycling services.

New lifestyle choices

“Instead of throwing away all of the waste that we produce, we need to start thinking more carefully about how to produce less waste in the first place, as well as what can be recycled, composted and reused.

“This is increasingly becoming the new lifestyle choice of so many consumers,” explained Xanthea Limberg, the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Informal Settlements, Water and Waste Services; and Energy.

“Expansion of the City’s network of drop-off sites enables this kind of responsible waste disposal by making it affordable and progressively more convenient to recycle and otherwise divert waste from landfills,” she concluded.