Governance and Filth: Urban Waste Management in Africa

Prologue

On 3^rd June 2015, disaster struck Accra in spectacular, biblical, fashion. Flood waters fire extinguished over 150 souls at a fuel station near the Kwame Nkrumah Circle. The disaster generated a national debate on urban waste management, notably the disposal of plastic waste, unregulated informal settlements and the link between poor drainage and perennial flooding in Accra. The tragedy also nearly drowned this article as it occurred about a week before its scheduled publication on the Okumah Blog. The ensuing debate made me rethink the thrust and timing of the article.

Unsurprisingly, much handwringing and pontification followed the June 2015 tragedy. Pundits of all stripes emerged to offer solutions or engage in I-told-you-so self-congratulation; men of God issued calls for prayers (to God, Allah and various other deities); and a raft of seemingly uncoordinated official actions and reactions ensued. To general applause, the city authorities embarked on willy-nilly demolition of fuel stations, unauthorized structures built on waterways and, most dramatically, the razing down of parts of Old Fadama, popularly called Sodom and Gomorrah, Accra’s most infamous slum. The sense of action somewhat mollified residents horrified and traumatized by the disaster, and the much-reviled Mayor of Accra gained a sudden, if eventually short-lived, spurt in popularity.

And then nothing… No new policies, plans or projects were unveiled, and some of the actions announced with much fanfare, such as the dredging of the Odaw River, seemed to stall or drift into the familiar quagmire of partisan political bickering. Then, on 12^th July, 2015 then President Mahama released a plastic trial balloon. He threatened that the Government might consider banning the use of plastics, “go the Rwanda way”, as he put it. This announcement unleashed a furious, and generally well-informed, debate on the management of plastic waste among stakeholders – manufacturers, consumers, environmental advocates and activists. The Minister responsible for the environment then followed up the presidential threat with an announcement that the production and importation of ultra thin plastic (under 60 micrograms) would be banned starting August 2015. August came and went. Nothing…

Months passed by. The harmattan arrived to dry out the rains and our memories. As residents began to complain about the dust and prayed for rain, the memory of 3^rd June receded. The cycle was repeated in 2016, with the predictable deluge of June and July. Still nothing. And then, dramatic change: elections on 8^th December 2016 ushered in a new government – and renewed hope that things might be different.

At this point, with Easter and a new rainy season once again upon us, I decided to resurrect my blog.

Chapter One: A Tale of Three Cities

As a rule, I am skeptical of newfangled rankings and lists – top 10 this, top 50 that. They seem to sprout everywhere nowadays. Surely, some rankings are sound and credible. These take the trouble to detail the criteria and methodologies used to arrive at their findings. Examples are the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report and UNDP’s Human Development Index. Similarly, Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index, the Mo Ibrahim Index and the Afrobarometer survey, which purport to measure good governance, are generally trusted. But for each credible ranking, dozens of sham ones are spawned. Many seem conceived to promote specific agendas or advocate certain causes.

Thus, I was naturally suspicious when I chanced upon a list of “Top 10 Cleanest Cities in Africa” published by a group called Africa Ranking, which claims to “provide in-depth information on the most interesting facts about Africa”. My suspicion increased when I noticed that my beloved Accra, at number seven, ranked higher than Windhoek, at number 10. (Incidentally, Windhoek was ranked the “cleanest city in Africa by another website, Skyscrapercity.com) I asked myself: Did these guys see the Odaw River? Did they smell the Korle Lagoon? Did they visit Sodom and Gomorrah?

1.1 The Miracle of Kigali

But when I saw Kigali ranked number one, I believed it. I first visited Kigali in 1985. At that time, a French colleague of mine described the city as “une grande bananerie” – one big banana plantation. That description was apt. The city did indeed seem to comprise mostly thatch-roofed huts and a few modern buildings scattered amidst lush, mostly banana, foliage. Fast forward to the 21^st century, and we have a different image. In the past decade or so, Kigali has undergone a near miraculous transformation. Today it is undoubtedly among the cleanest and most ordered cities anywhere. The thatch-roof houses have disappeared. And there isn’t a stray piece of paper, plastic or any kind of litter to be found anywhere. How did this change happen?

For most outsiders, the mention of Rwanda and its capital, Kigali, evoke sheer tragedy and horror. And for good reason: the 1994 genocide was certainly one of the greatest atrocities of the past century. But the other story of Rwanda, which deserves to be told and which Rwandan authorities strive, with mixed success, to tell the world is one of a nation motivated to bury its inglorious past, a nation rising, like a phoenix, from the ashes of shame and anguish to rebuild and grow. Rwanda in the 21^st century is a country obsessed with success and impatient with distractions to its quest to shine. This success must be achieved against severe odds: entrenched poverty, shortage of land and natural resources, difficulty of access due to its landlocked status and, of course, the need to rebuild trust and unity among a populace still traumatized by memories of genocide.

What Rwanda possesses is a leadership with a laser-sharp focus on socio-economic development. Its forward march to development is executed with remarkable discipline. In Rwanda, zero tolerance for corruption is more than a mere slogan. Government officials, from ministers and ambassadors to provincial and district chief executives are regularly called upon to publicly account for their stewardship. Each official’s performance is assessed against clearly defined indicators and targets. Rewards and sanctions are meted out accordingly. For instance, every three months, the Kigali City Council, along with its three districts – Nyarugenge, Kicukiro and Gasabo – organizes Public Accountability Days to which all residents, organizations and associations are invited to participate and question their leaders.

It is through this prism of accountable and results-oriented governance that one should view waste management in Kigali. The City Council operates an efficient system amidst what it acknowledges are a weak infrastructure coupled with severe financial and expertise constraints. In the medium term, it plans, with the assistance of external partners, to construct a sewerage system, an off-site treatment plant and a sanitary landfill, critical waste management infrastructures it currently lacks. But meanwhile the council intends “continuing, expanding, building-up and strengthening those services within our own capacities, required for sustained solid and liquid waste management system.”¹

Experts in the field talk about the 3Rs of waste management: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Rwanda has given a politically courageous twist to the first R, the concept of waste reduction. It has banned the use of all non-biodegradable plastic throughout the country! That policy alone has significantly reduced its waste management burden. Any casual observer can attest to the destructive impact of the widespread use of plastic bags in most cities in Africa. They litter the streets, choke the drains, pollute water bodies, poisoning and choking fish to death en masse. Yet most African governments seem to be at a loss on how to handle the problem.

Not Rwanda. The authorities, recognizing their limited capacity to reuse and recycle plastic waste, just banned it. The effect has been dramatic. As the table below shows, less than 2% of waste collected in the three districts of Kigali city is plastic-based. And most of this is of a type that can be collected and recycled. Rather, about 95% of the urban waste is from food, paper, grass, textile or wood, which are biodegradable and compostable. See Table below.

Types of Waste Generated in Kigali, by District

Source: Kigali State of Environment Report and Outlook 2013. Table 4.4

Another reason Kigali is clean is the way waste is collected. Designated private companies collect the waste directly from households, which paya nominal fee for the service. Fee-based household waste collection indeed exists in most African cities. But they are usually restricted to more affluent neighborhoods. Most other residents have to deal with container bins in their neighborhoods. These bins are supposed to be emptied regularly by waste management contractors. However, more often than not, the waste is not evacuated promptly and they become rubbish dumps. By removing these from the chain of waste management, the Kigali city council eliminated a significant environmental nuisance and health hazard.

Thus, Kigali, through a sensible and low-cost policy on plastic waste and a household-based waste collection system has managed to overcome its infrastructure and resource deficits and become arguably the cleanest city in Africa.

1.2 Moroni – A Modest and Precarious Success

In 2007, the first thing that struck a visitor to Moroni, the capital of Comoros, was the filth. I was one such visitor. Garbage and rubbish were everywhere; there was no attempt to hide them. Indeed the favorite dumping ground for household waste was “la corniche”, the beach road, which was also the city’s main highway. People transported waste from their homes (in head pans, wheelbarrows and taxis) and dumped them by the roadside. There were flies everywhere, as well as rats, mongooses and all sorts of vermin. The impact of all this filth on the health of the population was devastating. Cholera was endemic, commonly accepted as a fatality. Dermatological and gastro-intestinal afflictions were common, especially among children. International health and development specialists openly expressed fear of a plague outbreak.

For those unfamiliar with this pretty Indian Ocean archipelago, a brief recap of its recent history as well as the political and governance context may be in order. Comoros holds the African record of coups d’état and other disruptions of government. From independence in 1975 to 2001, the country witnessed at least 26 successful or attempted coups d’état, three mercenary invasions and the assassination of three presidents. Underneath all this turmoil flowed an undercurrent of separatism driven by the difficult co-habitation of the three main islands and an ongoing dispute with France for sovereignty over Mayotte, the fourth Island in the archipelago.

The turbulence has abated somewhat since the then Organization of African Unity (OAU) brokered a new constitution in 2001, which created the Union of Comoros, a shaky federal structure with a rotating presidency among the three constituent Islands – Grande Comore, Anjouan and Moheli. But such a long period of instability leaves a lasting imprint. Politics remains divisive and riven by suspicions. The threat of separatism is never far below the surface. Indeed in 2008, the Union government, with African Union endorsement and supported by troops from Sudan and Tanzania, invaded Anjouan Island to eject the separatist leader, Mohamed Bacar. Despite deep-seated poverty and other significant threats, including the fact that the main island sits on the very active Karthala Volcano, politicians prefer to engage in “la politique politicienne” (politics for politics sake), an unending wrangling on issues of little apparent relevance to socio-economic development. The political volatility has weakened national institutions and the population’s faith in them. In this context, nobody cared about waste management.

In 2007, when I arrived in Comoros as the United Nations Resident Coordinator, I convinced the UN country team to tackle filth in the capital, Moroni. Following a study commissioned to propose a sustainable waste management solution, a simple, cost-effective approach was devised. This hinged on three key components – collection, transportation and disposal of household waste. The minimalist approach reflected the modest resources available for the project.

The first challenge was to tackle waste collection from individual homes. This is critical to any urban waste management system. As waste is generated every day and people cannot live with waste in their homes, the prompt collection and evacuation of household waste is essential. When city authorities fail to provide effective waste collection and evacuation services people seek to dispose of their waste any way they can. In Moroni, some attempted to burn the waste, emitting toxic fumes. Many dumped it around their own or neighbors’ compounds. Those who wanted their immediate environs to be clean transported their waste farther afield. Improvised dumpsites sprung up at various public places, including around the Chinese and French embassies, outside the offices of the constitutional court, the island’s main harbor and several points along the beach road, attracting pests and scavengers of all kinds.

Surprisingly, organizing household waste collection in Moroni proved to be quite easy. Evacuation services were organized twice a week. Waste management trucks parked at designated spots for one hour at a time and households brought their accumulated trash at the appointed time. After one hour, the truck moved on to another spot. An intensive communication and education campaign accompanied this effort. The level of compliance was amazing, debunking widespread belief among expatriate and local skeptics alike that “Comorians don’t care about waste management; they simply don’t see the filth”.

Transportation of waste from collection to disposal sites is often the most expensive and logistically challenging aspect of waste management. In Moroni, this hurdle also proved relatively easy to overcome. After much wrangling and negotiation, the city authorities provided two waste disposal trucks and the UN provided a third. For a population of less than 100,000 this proved adequate. The three trucks followed predetermined routes and schedules for collection and disposal as described above.

Waste disposal, on the other hand, presented two significant difficulties. The first was eliminating the improvised dumpsites, which had grown into veritable rubbish mountains. The second was to identify a place to dump all the waste collected. The project organizers tackled the problem of improvised dump sites by organizing a well-publicized “Clean Moroni” campaign over three successive weekends. The campaign mobilized hundreds of city dwellers, who volunteered their labor, equipment, even trucks to clear the waste from the offending sites. The Vice-President of the Union, the Governor of the Island, the Mayor of Moroni as well as several political leaders participated in the exercise. “No rubbish” signs were erected at cleared sites and any waste dumped there was promptly evacuated. In an audacious twist, the project organizers decided to convert four of the largest dump sites, near the harbor and on the beach road, into mini-city parks. Horticulturists were hired to clear the land, landscape the areas and install benches.

The second and most important difficulty was that the city had no operational landfill for a permanent and safe disposal of waste collected from homes and intermediate dumpsites. As an interim measure, a temporary landfill was created at the city’s old airport located a fair distance from human settlements. This temporary solution was planned to last for six months pending the identification of a more appropriate landfill site by the Island and city authorities. Unfortunately, six months proved to be an optimistic estimate. The quest for a landfill site was politically contentious and dragged on for years. Meanwhile, the temporary landfill was continually expanded until it began to stretch beyond environmentally safe limits.

Despite this setback, the household collection system was sustained. Inspired by the initiative, several neighborhoods organized their own street cleaning exercises on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis. Public-spirited merchants and other individuals provided “motivation” to neighborhood youth engaged in the cleanup in the form of cash, T-shirts, food and other in-kind rewards.

The results of the Moroni waste management project were palpable. Within weeks, the city was rid of the eyesore of uncontrolled and widespread rubbish. The city’s example was emulated by the Island’s two other major cities, Mitsamiouili and Foumbouni, which launched their own waste management projects, with the support of other development partners. It is perhaps no coincidence that, since 2009, there has been no major outbreak of cholera in the city. However, the absence of a permanent sanitary landfill site hangs over the city like a Damocles sword.

1.3 Accra – Sound and fury signifying nothing

Ghana is one of only half a dozen or so countries in Africa where democracy truly thrives. Electoral politics is plural and highly competitive. The press is free, even if somewhat cacophonous in the margins. And there is a vocal and increasingly professional civil society, which seeks to hold government to account. The international community and governance experts applaud, and Ghanaians are justifiably proud of these achievements.

But there is a flip side to this nascent democracy. Governments elected into power with razor-thin margins hesitate to take actions that might negatively affect their fortunes in the next elections. In place of bold policy action, governments resort to propaganda (strategic communication is their preferred term), a smoke-and-mirrors imitation of governance, which yields stagnation at best. This has led to policy drift and hesitancy in many areas. There is also lack of policy continuity, as successive governments have preferred to rubbish and abandon (sometimes perfectly laudable) initiatives by their predecessors. Waste management in Accra epitomizes this policy vacillation.

Many visitors to Ghana’s capital, especially other Africans, love and admire the city. They cite its friendly people, safety and security – and cleanliness. And therein lies the rub. Most residents of Accra would be shocked to learn that visitors find their city clean. Indeed two mayors in the past decade have seen their political careers come unstuck due largely to their failure to deal with the filth of Accra. The immediate past mayor teetered precariously on the brink of citizen revolt for the very same reason. So, why do visitors see a clean city and residents perceive one wallowing in filth? The fact is, unlike Moroni, Accra hides its filth well. All ceremonial streets, major highways, commercial and administrative districts as well as higher income residential neighborhoods are kept scrupulously clean. These are the areas most visitors frequent. But most residents see, and live with, a different waste management reality. And they complain quite loudly.

There is indeed much to gripe about. However, in this paper, we will concentrate on three main aspects: household waste collection and disposal; management of plastic waste; and poor drainage. These three constitute not only the most urgent and significant challenges; they also have major ramifications on the city’s economy, health and disaster risk. I also posit that they are problems that can be addressed relatively painlessly with common sense approaches.

Household waste collection and disposal in Accra – a virtual apartheid

When it comes to collection and disposal of household waste, Accra is really two cities, with nothing in common at all. In the more affluent neighborhoods waste management contractors collect waste from households regularly and promptly. Residents pay an economic rate for this service. The result is a generally clean environment. The story is different in other parts of the city, which casual visitors do not see. Here, driven largely by misguided politico-electoral considerations, politicians and city authorities proclaim low-income residents too poor to pay a fee for waste collection and thus contribute to a clean and healthy environment for themselves and their families. So, there is no house-to-house waste collection. Rather, residents transport their rubbish to large container bins located in the communities. Waste management contractors are paid by the city to collect and transport the waste to designated landfills or other disposal sites.

The system does not work well. Payment to contractors is based on the volume of waste evacuated. Despite the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) spending about 80% of its revenues on waste management, it struggles to pay the contractors on time. Frequent delays in payments to contractors mean the waste is not evacuated on time or not at all. Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that of the 2800 metric tons of solid waste generated daily in Accra, only 2,200 are evacuated. Thus 600 metric tons of uncollected waste accumulates daily and is simply left to rot in situ – or, when it rains, to run off into open drains. (Of this, more later.) In some of the poorer neighborhoods it is a common sight to see vultures and other scavengers swarming overflowing container bins right in the middle of residential neighborhoods and markets.

An overflowing container bin in Accra (Source: Fei Baffoe, B, Busch, G, 2009: Solid Waste Management in Accra, Ghana, Anaerobic Digestion as an Appropriate Option prior to Landfilling, Journal of Solid Waste Technology and Management, 35(2):66-67

The plastic curse: litter, litter everywhere

In Ghana, as in many African countries, plastics are the packaging material of choice. Everything you buy, from a street hawker or roadside food seller, in a market or mall, is packed in a polythene bag. Plastic bags are popular because they are convenient and cheap. Increasingly, even the water you drink comes in a sealed plastic packet, commonly called “sachet” or “pure” water. Hundreds, of “pure water” companies all over the country produce and sell millions of this water-in-a-sachet every day. They are generally safe to drink. They also generate massive amounts of non-biodegradable waste.

In the absence of litterbins or other receptacles in public places and in many homes, plastic packaging is strewn indiscriminately in the open. Rain and wind then drive them to the open drains and water bodies, which they choke. Some find their way into the ocean. It is not uncommon for revelers at otherwise pristine beaches to be confronted with tons of plastic-laden waste blown back by the tide. And fishermen plying their trade close to the coast report many instances of shoals of fish choked to death by plastic waste and other toxic materials.

Residents moan and whine about the plastic waste. City, health and environmental authorities join in this chorus, complaining loudly about “irresponsible” littering by an uncooperative populace. But nobody does anything about it. There is too much at stake. The sachet water business has blossomed into a huge industry, providing employment and livelihood for many thousands of otherwise jobless Ghanaians. In September 2014, the National Association of Sachet and Packaged Water Producers (NASPAWAP) estimated that there are over 3,000 sachet water producers in the Accra-Tema metro area alone. Another 3,000 dot the rest of the country. Industry players estimate they contribute up to 100,000 direct and over a million indirect jobs² nationwide. These numbers confer significant clout on NASPAWAP, which has become a strong lobbying force. In the highly competitive politics of Ghana, no politician can ignore these numbers. They also give pause to over-zealous regulators. Thus, occasional talk of a tax on sachet water to fund plastic waste management tends to fizzle out in the face of robust resistance by producers.

The overabundance of plastic has led to a fledgling plastic waste recycling industry. A variety of private sector and NGO initiatives have been launched to collect and recycle plastic waste following the 3R (Reduce-Recycle-Reuse) model. Two of the major players in the field, Zoomlion and J Stanley Owusu & Co., have initiated industrial-scale 3R projects, which aim to convert plastic waste into pelletized fuel for use in kilns. Other smaller companies, such as Jekora Ventures and Trashy Bags contribute their bit. But these initiatives do not match the scale of the problem.

Clogged gutters and stagnant lagoons

Poor drainage aggravates waste management problems in Accra. Those familiar with the topography of Accra know that most of the city is encased in hills stretching from Macarthy Hill, Weija and Tantra Hill in the west and northwest through Pokuase and the University of Ghana in the north and then eastwards towards Peduase and the Akuapem mountains. Inside the concave formed by these hill formations lies the bulk of the city – the central business district, government ministries and residential areas where more than half of 3 million residents of the city live. All of this is flatland and, when it rains, much of it becomes wetland.

Why is the topography of Accra germane to its waste management? It is because the city has a notorious drainage and sewerage system. The open drains constructed in colonial times still crisscross the city. Mostly, these have become receptacles for dross and litter of all kinds, but increasingly of plastic waste. When it rains, the effluvium from most of the open drains flows in one direction – towards the Odaw River. This “river”, now merely one big waste receptacle, runs from north to south for some 10 km towards the sea. But it never reaches the ocean; its access it blocked by the Korle Lagoon into which it empties its contents.

The Odaw River and Korle Lagoon, which now form a single co-mingled water body, represent a spectacular failure of waste management, and indeed city planning. It does not take excessive imagination to picture a clean and blue waterway running down the middle of Accra like the Thames in London, the Seine in Paris or the Rhine and Danube in Belgrade. Rather, on the shores of the Odaw and Korle have sprouted various markets, business and informal settlements, including the infamous Old Fadama, commonly called, with some justification, Sodom and Gomorrah. Rather than lagoon and river cruises and restaurants, the Odaw and Korle showcase the biggest eyesore – a health and environmental calamity in the city.

Images Old Fadama (“Sodom and Gomorrah”)

As mentioned above, we limit ourselves in this article to the three issues only. But there is more. For instance, we have not tackled the scandalous liquid waste (mis) management of the city. On this topic, an excellent article by Sjaak van der Geest and Nelson Obirih-Opareh titled “Liquid Waste Management in Urban and Rural Ghana: Privatisation as Governance” states: “If availability of toilet facilities and the method of removal and disposal are indications of level of development, the city of Accra cannot be rated high on the scale of development. The infrastructure of the Accra central sewage system is inadequate. In 1999, there were less than 1,000 units connected to the central sewage system (GW&SC 1999). In most places, the infrastructure for waste management is either non-existent or in a deplorable state. As Akuffo (1999) noted, there are about 18 sewage systems and sewage treatment plants in Accra, but none of them is operating according to plan. The system that was built for Central Accra in the early 1970s by the Busia government is no longer adequate. There are few connections and insufficient links to water to enable flushing. In Accra, liquid waste management has broken down due to a lack of human, logistic and financial resources.” And, I would add, a deficit of political will and imagination. There is also the whole business of sanitary landfills, waste processing, recycling and waste-to-energy perspectives, etc.

But, let us return to the three waste management issues highlighted in this article – household waste collection and disposal; plastic waste management; and drainage/flood control.

Chapter Two: The way forward for Accra

So, let’s take the three issues one by one and consider possible solutions in the light of experiences from successful programs elsewhere in Africa.

2.1 Collection and disposal of household waste

For the purposes of this article, I include markets and other business premises along with individual dwellings. The short-term goal, say over a 12-month period, would be to institute a system whereby households and businesses transport their accumulated trash directly for collection by waste collection trucks, tricycles and other evacuation vehicles.

A tricycle-borne waste bin. Convenient for accessing high-density communities and markets

The frequency of collection could vary, from, say, daily in markets and business areas to once or twice a week in residential areas depending on their density. This is the first step to eliminating all container bins and other intermediate community waste dumps. As the examples of Kigali and Moroni demonstrate, household-to-truck waste collection is less intimidating than it might appear. With sufficient information and education, the population will readily comply. The flip side, of course, is that the waste collectors should keep to their advertised schedules in order to sustain the confidence of residents. Concurrently, a campaign should be launched to rid all communities of container bins and other dumpsites. It is important to involve concerned communities in these exercises in order to secure their buy-in for the new waste collection and disposal regime. Wherever feasible, the empty lots created by the removal of intermediate dumpsites should be replaced by green spaces.

The successful collection and evacuation of household and community-based waste depends on the availability of adequate sanitary landfills or other disposal facilities. This is a challenge, as current available landfill space can only accommodate about three quarters of Accra’s total waste generation. It may be necessary to employ emergency measures to identify or create temporary (but sanitized) landfill sites to receive the additional waste. One could envisage mobilization of the army corps of engineers, as well as resources of existing waste management companies to help create such disposal sites.

However, in the medium to long term, the goal should be to eliminate landfills altogether through the adoption of waste-to-energy technologies. Thus, it was heartening to hear Prof. Frimpong Boateng, the new Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation state, at his parliamentary vetting, that this is precisely the new Government’s vision. Subsequently, the Minister has announced the Government’s ambition to derive up to 10 percent of national electricity output from waste by 2020. This is a laudable objective. It is also achievable. In recent decades, waste to energy (WtE) technology has been developed and applied in countries across the world, yielding a double benefit: minimizing the volume of waste and increasing proportion of clean, renewable energy. A variety of technological processes for WtE have been developed, including incineration, gasification, thermal de-polymerization, anaerobic digestion and fermentation processes. All these processes can produce electricity and/or heat directly or yield by-products, such as methane-rich biogas, ethanol and hydrogen, which can then be used to fuel energy production.

Indeed previous governments in Ghana have had this same laudable idea. But the WtE projects conceived have not come to fruition. The most recent, and probably most significant, example was the agreement signed in July 2015 between the Ministry of Local Government, on behalf of the Government of Ghana, and Armech Africa Limited to build an Integrated Waste Management System in Kpone, some 30 km from Accra, which would receive all the waste generated daily in Accra and, after extracting valuable recyclable goods, convert the remaining waste to electricity for the national grid. The technology proposed for the Kpone plant is up to date. “All waste is transferred to a Tunnel Bio-Reactor, a modularized above-ground landfill, which transforms outdated waste management by doing away with landfills and creating the cleanest bio-energy from waste”, according to the project proposal. As I write this, the status of this project is unknown.

So, why have perfectly laudable WtE initiatives failed to gain traction in Ghana, and what can the new government do differently to ensure a successful outcome? Maybe Ghana could learn from a couple of successful examples from elsewhere. First, Mauritius: this Indian Ocean island country of 1.2 million people touts itself as operating one of the best integrated waste management systems in the world, and certainly the best in Africa. According to the country’s Central Energy Board (CEB), “The Government of Mauritius’ energy policy encourages the use of renewable and clean energy to reduce the country’s dependence on fossil fuels and decrease greenhouse gas emissions; it aims to increase the use of renewable sources from 20% in 2016 to 35% by 2025 (…) The government has indicated that renewable energy will be an important aspect of the next budget, and it is currently developing a variety of plans in this field.  In 2014, a total volume of 2,937 GWh was generated, with only 20% from renewable sources, including bagasse (sugarcane waste). While bagasse remains the key source of renewable energy (16%), Mauritius derived the remaining 4% of renewable electricity generation from hydro, wind, landfill gas and solar.”  With two WtE plants due to come on-stream in the second half of 2017, the Government hopes to generate 8% of national electricity output from waste.

There are a couple of points to note and lessons to be learned here. First, the Government of Mauritius has a deliberate and consistent policy to reduce its carbon emissions by moving progressively towards renewable and clean energy. Thus, its WtE initiatives fit into a clearly defined vision and plan. This is different from the situation in Ghana where there has been a notable lack of policy continuity and coherence. Second, the Government is putting its money where its mouth is. Although the WtE and other renewable energy projects are private sector driven, the national budget accords renewable energy sufficient priority to ensure that projects promised are actually delivered.

For those who think such initiatives are easier to manage in Mauritius because it is a small country and, is therefore, “more manageable”, the following should give pause: According to Wikipedia, during the 2001–2007 period, global WtE capacity increased by about four million metric tons per annum. In China, there were about 434 WtE plants in early 2016. Japan is the largest user in thermal treatment of municipal solid waste in the world with 40 million tons.” Surely, China and Japan are no small countries. And neither is Indonesia, which as of June 2014 had a total of 93.5MW of installed capacity of WtE, with a pipeline of projects amounting to another 373MW of capacity. It is global bandwagon. Ghana should jump onto it.

2.2 Dealing with plastic waste

The example of Rwanda demonstrates what drastic policy measures can achieve in minimizing plastic waste. However, Accra and Ghana generally may not be amenable to the zero plastic solution in the immediate term. Sachet water is a major complicating factor. As pointed out earlier, the industry provides employment and livelihoods for hundreds of thousands of people throughout the country. It also provides other undeniable benefits. Ghanaians are drinking more and cleaner water than ever before, which is certainly beneficial from a health perspective. At funerals, weddings and other social events, water now predominates over beer and other beverages. So, aside the political consideration of risking the ire of over a million potential voters, there are economic, social and health aspects to consider.

So, what to do? I suggest a phased approach. Despite the brave efforts of some NGOs and private sector entities to collect and recycle plastic waste, the proportion of plastic waste recycled is infinitesimal relative to the quantum of its output. Second, there is no system in place for collecting the plastic waste, which ends up in the streets and gutters of Accra. In fact, a good citizen wishing to dispose of such waste after quenching his or her thirst with sachet water would be hard put to find a receptacle anywhere in Accra to dispose of it. Thus, in the short term, two things must be done. First, measures should be put in place to significantly increase the proportion of plastic waste that is recycled. Central government and city authorities should provide incentives, through tax relief and other policy measures, to induce the plastic waste recycling industry to significantly expand its capacity. New players may be induced to join the industry and existing recyclers with the right resources should be encouraged to increase their capacity. Concomitantly, measures must be instituted to collect plastic waste at source. The placement of plastic-only receptacles in public places could do wonders. At the household level, the separation of plastic from other waste could be envisaged as a means to facilitate recycling.

In the medium term, Government and city authorities should envisage a substantial reduction in the amount of plastic waste produced. With regard to sachet water, Government could, through tax incentives (and sanctions) decrease the proportion of sachet water relative to bottled water, which is easier to collect and recycle. A similar approach could be adopted for everything from shopping bags in upscale supermarkets and malls to the ubiquitous and unsightly black plastic bags used for packaging everything from smoked fish to roasted plantains and even soup in the streets and markets. Supermarkets, malls and upscale shops could be encouraged to introduce paper and reusable cloth bags in order to progressively reduce the quantity of plastic bags. In Mauritius and South Africa, shoppers who choose plastic shopping bags pay a special “plastic tax”. Plastic bags used to package food should be progressively replaced by reusable plastic dishes, which are more hygienic.

2.3 Draining the swamp

Better managing plastic waste and thus reducing its contamination of gutters and drains would surely reduce the plague of annual floods that afflicts Accra. But it would not be enough. The perennial flooding of Accra, no doubt aggravated in recent years by plastic waste, cannot be resolved until the Odaw River and Korle Lagoon have been unclogged, drained and provided an outlet to the ocean. As it is, most of the sewage and other effluents of the central, northeastern and northwestern parts of the city flow into the now stagnant water body. Without an outlet, when it rains, the open drains and gutters, also chocked by plastic waste, are backed up and their contents are spewed onto nearby streets, homes and markets. The sight is not pretty. And the outcome is not healthy. The now yearly outbreak of cholera during the rainy season is testimony enough.

Obviously, resolving the drainage problem of Accra is a costly and long-term proposition. It does not lend itself to the quick-fix interventions, which recent governments have resorted to. The topography of Accra and the city’s increasing population demand longer-term, more permanent solutions. City managers and planners are well aware of this. Indeed, over the years, through successive administrations, a variety of projects, have been announced to dredge the Odaw/Korle swamp and de-silt the drains and gutters that deposit their effluvium into its torpid pool. The most significant effort in recent years is the Korle Lagoon Ecological Restoration Project (KLERP), for which city authorities were said to have secured funding. However, the project appears to be at a standstill. So, everybody agrees that the cleanup and restoration of the Odaw-Korle swamp is important; the planning, engineering and financial aspects have been thought through, and the project deemed feasible. So, why have all these bright ideas come to naught?

Answer: complications – serious socio-political complications. Over the past several decades, large informal settlements, markets and other business have sprouted along the banks of the Odaw River and Korle Lagoon. These settlements include Korle Dudor, Adadinkpo, Old and New Fadama. The emergence of large human settlements and commercial activity has introduced a dimension beyond engineering and funding, which must be handled delicately. It calls for political courage and wisdom, and a vision of the transformation of the water body, which encompasses resettlement and/or rebuilding of some or all of these communities. The case of Old Fadama, in particular seems to confound political leaders. This settlement, originally conceived as a temporary refuge for persons displaced by development or sporadic conflicts within Accra, has, through successive waves of settlement and resettlement (including the huge numbers displaced by Nanumba-Kokomba conflict in the Northern Region of Ghana in the 1990s), morphed into a veritable township sheltering over 100,000 souls. Sodom and Gomorrah, as the settlement is commonly called, is the classic slum – overcrowded, unsanitary, crime and disease-ridden, with zero to poor access to public utilities and social services. Moreover, it is prone to inter-ethnic violence. The settlement is also the site of perhaps one of the largest e-waste dumpsites in the world. Some youthful residents consider this as a boon. They scavenge the dumpsite, setting fire to the discarded computers, printers and the like, with a view to harvesting for sale the cables, wire and coils buried in their entrails. This is a dangerous way to earn a living. The burning e-waste emits toxic fumes and pollutants, which pose a serious threat to health. But the youth are not daunted. For many, it is the only way to earn a living.

Clearly, these settlements must be “dealt with” before any comprehensive transformation of the Odaw-Korle channel can proceed or succeed. However, Sodom and Gomorrah, the Agbogbloshie and Timber markets as well as other nearby communities are voter-rich, a factor not lost on politicians who might consider dislodging them as part of an Odaw-Korle transformation project. Besides, in Ghana’s polarized and hyper-partisan politics, opposition parties have been rumored to actively sabotage efforts to relocate some of these communities in order to curry their favor and win their votes. Well-meaning NGO and human rights activists add another layer of complication. Their efforts to improve the deplorable living conditions and protect residents, particularly women and children, from abuse sometimes seem to reinforce the “squatters’ rights” mentality of residents.

While most experts agree that unclogging and draining the Odaw-Korle swamp is essential to resolving Accra’s flooding problem, it must go hand-in-hand with other ancillary works. The three main tributaries that feed the Odaw and Korle with effluvium are the Nima, Kaneshie and Agbogbloshie drains. These colonial-era open super-drains have become dumping grounds for solid and liquid waste. They must be covered. So long as they remain an open receptacle for waste, they will continue to contaminate the Odaw and Korle. A medium term goal should be to eliminate open drains in the capital. As a first step, all new city roads must be constructed with covered drains. In addition to staunching the flow of plastic and other waste into the Odaw and Korle, this will minimize a major environmental nuisance and health hazard in the city.

Chapter Three: Yes, We Can

Despite the multiple challenges cited above, Accra is better equipped than most African cities to overcome its waste management predicament. The city, and Ghana as a whole, possesses the substantial technical knowledge and capacity. The country’s leading waste management company, Zoomlion, is arguably the only genuine multinational waste management company in Africa. Zoomlion won and successfully executed contracts to clean up stadia in Angola, Equatorial Guinea and South Africa during the 2008 and 2010 Cup Africa Cup of Nations and FIFA World tournaments in those countries. Excluding Ghana, the company currently operates in six African countries: Angola, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Togo and Zambia. In Ghana, through contracts with municipal, urban and district assemblies, it operates in towns and cities all across the country. The company has introduced several innovations, including the manufacture and deployment of tricycles to facilitate waste collection from hard-to-access communities and crowded markets.

Zoomlion also initiated the Accra Compost and Recycle Plant (AcARP) designed with an initial capacity to treat up to 600 tons of waste per day. The AcARP, sited at Agyen Kotoku in the Ga North municipality, is a public-private partnership (PPP) involving several government, NGO and private sector entities. But the most forward-looking initiative of Zoomlion is without a doubt the Africa Institute of Sanitation and Waste Management established in partnership with the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology(KNUST). The institute aims to develop local and regional capacities of waste management operators as well deepen the knowledge and conduct research to underpin policy formulation and planning. The institute complements the academic and research work undertaken in the field by Ghana’s leading universities, the University of Ghana and the KNUST.

The Africa Institute of Sanitation and Waste Management campus at Madina, Accra

In recent years, Zoomlion has veered into areas not directly related to its core waste management business. As mentioned above, it is also pursuing plans to expand its operations into an increasing number of African countries. It is hoped that these excursions will not lead the company to reduce its focus on leading the cleanup of Ghana through a massive expansion and enhancement of its services. For the task ahead is massive.

A noteworthy, albeit smaller, competitor to Zoomlion is J Stanley Owusu and Co (JSO). JSO, whose roots date back to quarrying in the 1960s, touts itself as a pioneer in waste management in Ghana, as it incorporated the first full-fledged waste management company in 1970. In addition to household and community waste collection and management, JSO builds and manages waste transfer stations and landfills. Through its two subsidiary companies, the Accra Liquid and Solid Waste Management Company and the Kumasi Waste Management Company, JSO is embarking on waste-to-energy projects in the two cities.

Buttressed by the research and knowledge generated by the universities and the institute, Zoomlion, JSO and other waste management companies operating throughout the country provide sufficient real and latent capacity to address the waste management needs of Ghana and its capital city.

Epilogue
Researchers and other experts who have studied the waste management debacle in Accra and other major cities in Ghana have identified the lack of political will and leadership as a major hindrance towards resolving the problem. Hence, the heading for Section 1.3: “Sound and fury signifying nothing”. Thus, the weight of expectation on the Government inaugurated in January 2017 is heavy. The Government has signaled that it will take environmental conservation and sanitation very seriously. The President in his State of the Nation address on 21 February 2017 cited the environment, notably preservation of water bodies and urban waste management, as key priorities of his government. The newly appointed Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation is an eminent scientist celebrated for his competence and passion. Two brand new ministries have been created whose mandate includes a focus on environmental sanitation. They are the Ministry of Water and Sanitation and the Ministry of Zongo and Inner City Development. The Greater Accra Regional Minister and the Mayor of Accra have both declared waste management a key priority.

Any visitor to Ghana in the first four months of 2017 would be struck by the intense pro-environment fervor that has gripped the country. The media are inundated by citizens expressing outrage and disgust at the wanton pillage of our environmental treasury and the accumulation of filth in our cities. Politicians, pastors and opinion leaders of all stripes have leapt onto the bandwagon. While the social media campaign, #StopGalamseyNow³, has garnered the most public attention, there is also intense agitation to “do something” about urban waste management. Public awareness about environmental sustainability has surely dawned on Ghana.

Perhaps it is not coincidental or surprising that public awareness and agitation for action have intensified with the arrival of this new Government. The message of change it heralded, the boldness that has characterized some of its early initiatives and the clear signals that it is committed to tackling environmental head on have emboldened activists and given hope to the citizenry that the political will and leadership they have long prayed for may be at hand.

I also dare to hope, for I am convinced that we must and can conquer filth.