The National Green Tribunal’s Regional Monitoring Committee (South) on Solid Waste Management has suggested that all southern States replicate the decentralised waste management model implemented in apartment complexes in Kochi by the Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Association of India (CREDAI) Clean City Movement.
The committee, headed by P. Jyothimani, proposed the idea after visiting a facility for processing biodegradable waste in an apartment complex near Marine Drive on Friday. “The committee has asked CREDAI programme representatives to visit Chennai to make a presentation for all corporations and municipalities in Tamil Nadu. Other States could follow it up and replicate the model if it is found helpful,” Mr. Jyothimani said.
Maintaining that the committee was really impressed with the strict enforcement of solid waste management rules in the apartments, Mr. Jyothimani pointed out that the collection of waste from the doorstep and its segregation in coloured buckets were also found successful. “The method they [apartment complexes] enforce to ensure discipline in the process, like not collecting waste if rules are found violated, is welcome,” he said.
The Clean City Movement offers three waste management solutions. It provides bio-bins and biogas plants to treat biodegradable waste to turn it into manure and biogas respectively and recycles non-biodegradable waste such as plastic.
Besides Ernakulam, the services of the NGO, formed in 2007 as a corporate social responsibility initiative of CREDAI, are available in Thiruvananthapuram, Kottayam, Kannur, Kozhikode, Thrissur and Palakkad districts.
It has installations in 65 apartments benefiting over 35,000 families. The approximate biodegradable waste processed at source daily is over 30 tonnes. The waste management programme has generated employment for nearly 750 women.
