LaDMA, GAYO launch waste mgt programme

A programme dubbed Zero-Waste Strategy, which is aimed at improving the waste management systems in the country, was launched in Accra yesterday.

Launched by Green Africa Youth Organisation (GAYO), a non-governmental organisation, in partnership with the La Dade-Kotopon Municipal Assembly (LaDMA), the programme is to serve as a road map for the effective management of waste and other sanitation issues by the municipal assembly and other stakeholders. 

As part of the launch, the two parties also signed a two-year Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in order to work together in the fight against waste and poor sanitation issues facing the assembly.

The programme formed part of activities to mark the celebration of the World Cities Day on the theme,‘Zero Waste for a Sustainable City’.

The Executive Director of GAYO, Mr Joshua Amponsem,in his address, said the programme formed part of their vision of having clean environment and a sustainable city, which is in line with the Sustainable Development Goal 11.

Mr Amponsem noted that the launch of the waste management programme was timely, considering the fact that municipal assemblies in the country faced the sanitation challenges that needed a guideline to address.

He said GAYO would continue to partner stakeholders in the sanitation sector to roll out initiatives that would positively impact the lives of the people, and called on the Management of LADMA and other stakeholders to apply the strategies in the document to make it relevant.

The Municipal Coordinating Director of La Dade-Kotopon Municipal Assembly, Mr Daniel Nkrumah, expressed gratitude to GAYO for coming up with such a strategic programme.

According to him, the issue of sanitation was of great concern to the Assembly as 70 per cent of the wastes generated in its jurisdiction were plastic, while 30 per cent constituted organic waste.

He said as a way of addressing this issue, the assembly would adopt a number of strategies in the zero-waste document.

He indicated that through the Assembly’s partnership with GAYO, there would be a sensitisation programme for the people in the jurisdiction, and creation of a mobile transfer station, where waste-collecting vans would collect the waste, which would then be recycled into different products.

Expressing his thought on the ban on the operations of tricycles on highways, Mr Nkrumah said the Assembly agreed with that decision of the government but indicated that their services would be needed in the smaller communities where waste collecting vans could not operate.

In a speech read on her behalf, the Mayor of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), Mrs Elizabeth NaaKwatsoeTawia Sackey, explained that the Assembly held the issue of waste management and sanitation in high regard.

She noted that as way of reducing the greenhouse effect in the country, the AMA had adopted a climate action plan and the assembly would ensure that every resident would contribute to its success.

BY VIVIAN ARTHUR & BENJAMIN ARCTON-TETTEY