Solid wastes cause growing concern for habitat

With very limited waste management facilities in both urban and rural areas in the country, Bangladesh will observe today the World Habitat Day 2019, looking to emphasise on ‘Frontier technologies as an innovative tool to transform waste to wealth,’ this year’s theme.

Adaptation of new technologies for transforming wastes into wealth, as done by the developed countries in the world, is still a far cry in the country where no basic waste management facility was developed, urban planners, researchers and environmentalists said.

Every year, they said, the country is losing agricultural land and habitats of people, animal and birds for scattered disposals of an estimated 2.24 crore tonnes of solid wastes and unknown volume of faecal sludge dumped in open spaces.

Dumping continues despite the enactment of three acts, five rules, six policies and 10 guidelines and circulars for environment-friendly managements of wastes and reusing and recycling those as fuel, fertiliser and power.

After framing Bangladesh Environmental Conservation Act 1995, Fertiliser Act 2006 and City Corporation Act 2009 with mandatory clauses for environment-friendly management of wastes, environmental and water pollution continues for haphazard disposal of solid, industrial and faecal wastes in open spaces, low-lying areas, next to roads, canals and rivers, they said.

City corporations, municipalities, water supply and sewerage authorities, industries, hospitals and people grossly ignored the provisions kept for ensuring proper waste management stipulated in biomedical  waste management rules 2008, lead acid battery recycling and management rules 2006, Bangladesh environmental conservation rules 1997.

Revised national urban policy 2015, national agricultural policy 2012, national industrial policy 2005, national policy for water supply and sanitation 2014, urban management policy statement 1998, and 10 other guidelines and circular issued by different ministries could not even enforce proper waste management system in the country, lamented the experts.

The environmentalists and urban planners said such uncontrolled disposals of domestic wastes, kitchen market wastes, faecal sludge and medical wastes kept on polluting the environment, damaging fertility of the soil and spreading malaria and respiratory problems, and several other water-prone diseases.

For the failure, they blame wrong policy adaptations, inaction for executing clauses and guidelines of laws and rules, poor allocation of budget for sanitation and solid waste management, bureaucratic tangles among the local government and rural development ministry, ministry of environment, housing ministry and their subordinating agencies.

‘It is ridiculous to see government talking about adapting latest technologies for producing diesels, electricity, fertilisers and others without even introducing the basic waste collection and disposal mechanism,’ Bangladesh Institute of Planners’ general secretary Adil Muhammad Khan said.

‘We failed to introduce segregated waste collection system at every household, environment-friendly disposal system at the community level and in the landfills,’ he said.

‘Only 20 per cent area in the capital is under swage coverage. For absence of dumping wastes from the septic tanks in the remaining areas, people discharge faecal sludge into the storm drain meant for draining out rainwater,’ he said.

The local governing bodies failed to develop solid waste and sewage dumping facilities in the remaining parts of the country, he said.

Dhaka Wasa provides vacuum tanker facilities only in the Gulshan area in the capital for carrying out sludge from the septic tanks of the households and only 20 out of 327 municipalities have such facilities, said Iftekhar Enayetullah, co-founder and director of Waste Concern, an NGO working for recycling of waste and renewable energy.

Rajdhani Unnyayan Kartripakkhya’s survey report for the capital’s next master plan till the year 2035 shows that at present an estimated 35,110 tonnes of solid wastes are produced every day, which will be 47,064 tonnes in 2025, in the fast-growing Dhaka.

About 37 per cent of generated waste is collected and dumped at the two landfill sites in Matuail and Amin Bazar. Other garbage is dumped in open spaces, beside roads and even in manholes and canals blocking the drainage system, the study reveals.

‘Initiatives must be taken for proper disposals of 100 per cent solid wastes and reusing and recycling those as the capital cannot provide much spaces solely designated for dumping wastes,’ Rajuk’s DAP project director Md Ashraful Islam said.

Locals at Matuail and Amin Bazar said that following the development of the landfill sites after 1990s, birds in the vast low-lying areas of the two places disappeared.

It has also had impact on the health of the locals and serious environmental impact on the adjacent 200 acres of crop fields and fisheries the revealed two separate studies carried out by CEGIS and four students of Dhaka University’s soil science department.

Department of environment’s project director of Programmatic Clean Development Mechanism project  Abul Kalam Azad said that the department already started a project in Narayanganj for making fertiliser and diesels. 

‘Such plants will be initiated in all 64 countries if we get fund,’ Kalam said.

We were producing 600 to 700 litres of diesels burning one tonne of garbage, he claimed

LGRD minister Md Tajul Islam admitted that solid waste management system had not been developed accordingly for poor budget allocation and planning.

‘With the power division, we initiated a project to generate power burning wastes at Amin Bazar,’ the minister said.

Such projects would be initiated gradually across the country, he said.

The president Abdul Hamid will inaugurate the World Habitat Day observation programme organised by the housing ministry at Bangabandhu International Convention Centre today.

Housing and building research institute will organise a three-day fair on its premises.

Newspapers will publish special supplements marking the day. 

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net