The annual IWMSA Landfill and Waste Treatment Conference (LaWTiG), this year, hosted by the Kwa-Zulu-Natal branch, brought voices from national and local government, engineers, scientists, and waste management practitioners together for an insightful and productive three days.

The responses from those in attendance revealed both the vitality of bringing the sector together and the broad conversations that were sparked by the speakers.

Dr Mark Williams-Wynn from EWaste Africa reports: The WIMSA landfill and waste treatment conference is important for us at EWaste Africa. While we think about recycling, it’s important to connect to other spheres of the waste sector, looking at how we can reduce the amount of e-waste that is being sent to landfill to reduce the impact. E-waste is one of the more hazardous types of waste that ends up in landfills, and the question is, how do we make it as easy as possible for people to prevent that e-waste from going to landfills, filling up the landfills, and polluting the environment?

Andrew Nyakusinga from SRK Consulting: This conference was quite enlightening. Allowing me to look at the different ways in which we can treat our waste. Exploring different ways in which we can make use of the waste and all instead of just dumping it at a landfill site. So it’s essentially really looking at the whole landfill, landfilling aspect of it. I was more interested in the leachate and how people are treating the leachate, and how people are reusing leachate in various forms, and how. I’m quite excited to see how those technologies go forward. There were some really interesting cast studies offering some unique perspectives. Going forward, I think governments, different stakeholders, consultants, engineers and the public in general should come together, get to know how to resolve this big issue called waste.

Dr Nthabiseng Motsoane from EnviroServ adds: So the conference question “land full, where to from here?” Engages us to find more innovative solutions, especially for some of the critical aspects, such as leachate, because we all know the harm that leachate poses to the environment and public health. So it is extremely crucial for us to come up with innovative, sustainable solutions that are adaptable, especially to our African continent. We tend to get advice from Europe, but we need to understand the African and South African context.

Aiden Bowers from the Department of Forestry, Fisheries, and Environment says: Reflecting on this gathering, it’s clear that the time is near us to start transitioning away from landfills. We need to start creating the right conditions to enable that. And as the national government, we are pushing baseline enforcement to allow for alternatives to become more viable.

Heather Shard from IWMSA, reflecting as a host, says: It’s been a really excellent conference. We have had some interesting presentations, fantastic networking opportunities, and we’ve really had some great feedback from the delegates who have attended. We are really glad to have been able to host this conference in person, because the last one we had to hold it virtually. So it’s been a great opportunity to get everyone together and talking about landfills and waste treatment.