To the old saying “Death and taxes are inevitable”, I would add a third – trash. As long as modern mankind has been around, he has generated waste, and the problem is getting worse. Is there a solution other than not generating waste?

By Reg Barichievy, team leader of Waste Synergy

One way of keeping a shopping centre clean is to clean it and then lock the doors. Effective but not sustainable. Given that we have to let people in, we need to manage the waste they produce, and the solution needs to be sustainable.

And that is the problem; at the moment, our waste management practices are not sustainable. South Africa is dependent on landfilling as its primary disposal method. The landfills are too few, often too far from the town centre and suffer from a lack of infrastructure and funding.
Municipalities that manage the landfills have the same problems as well as mismanagement and, in some instances, corruption. Private sector service providers who manage waste have their problems too, with average increases in fuel and labour costs being the biggest.

Old ways

These problems are indicative of a linear economy and old technology. If we are to improve our systems and catch up with best practice, we need to change the way we do business. Whilst South Africa is making progress in its efforts to manage waste effectively, it still lags Europe, which may be an unfair comparison because that is the gold standard. We can, however, learn from them and adapt some of their best practice.

In Europe, the disposal method has largely changed from landfill to waste-to-energy. Their level of development, resources and climate assist in this. The populations are generally more urbanised than South Africa’s and certainly more aware of waste management. We have very few waste-to-energy plants, and those are not widely commercially available.

Realistically, we cannot expect further funding from the central government in the short term. Some progress is being made in impact investing, but this is unlikely to yield results for some time. There is also a lack of large programmes which assist with the development of policy and its implementation.

Innovation with what we have

Faced with these constraints, we will have to make a plan, something South Africans are very good at. In the short term, we believe a solution lies in adopting sustainable recycling and waste management practices, being innovative in repurposing and creating awareness and understanding among all of us.

At the moment, the emphasis is still on removing waste from the premises as quickly and cheaply as possible. If waste generators start by looking at what they produce and study where it originates, then they will see the bigger picture more clearly and be able to take action to prevent or minimise waste at source.

The solutions depend on the specific business, but there are several principles common to all. Measuring what is coming in and what is going out should be a fundamental management practice. It is only by understanding where and how waste is generated that one can take steps to minimise it. Regular waste audits assist this.

Ensuring that recyclable waste is not contaminated in the collecting process will minimise contamination and maximise the income for the waste generator.

Making staff, clients and stakeholders aware of the drive to sustainable waste management on a global scale and bringing that back to the workplace fosters understanding and buy-in. Most staff members collect waste not knowing why they are doing it. To them, it is just waste which must be thrown away.

We have many challenges in the implementation of waste management systems in this country, but these simple steps can be an interim solution.