I am pleased to announce that the City of Johannesburg recently won the prestigious Waste Pickers Integration in the Municipal System 2019 award which recognises local and metropolitan cities that have excelled at all levels of sustainable development.
The Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries honoured the City for its continuous and devoted implementation of the Waste Act and waste minimisation, an integral part of managing waste better in South Africa.
The announcement was made by the Deputy Director General of Chemicals and Waste Management: Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries, Mr Mark Gordon, at the Waste Khoro 2019: Asbestos and Land Remediation Summit held in the North West.
Given the City’s ultimate objective of waste minimisation, efforts have been concentrated to engagement with Waste Pickers, one of the key stakeholders in increasing the yield of recyclable materials diverted from Pikitup landfill sites.
The City is currently embarking on the registration of Waste Pickers across Johannesburg, with 1 200 already recorded in Region D by the City’s Department of Environment and Infrastructure Services, in conjunction with Pikitup.
The registration is conducted to afford Waste Pickers training opportunities and to benefit from waste minimisation value chain projects.
Waste pickers’ contribution to saving the remaining landfill space could not be quantified due to the informal nature of their business activities. Therefore, the department established a forum where Waste Pickers are registered and will consolidate a database to better engage with Waste Pickers in the future.
The engagement will identify how the City can assist Waste Pickers with protective clothing, tools of the trade, and inoculations through corporate sponsorship.
Pikitup is refurbishing dumping sites, also known as garden sites, to make provisions to accommodate the Waste Pickers to successfully store their trollies.
Some of the objectives of the registration process included:
- To recognise Waste Pikers who are currently in the system for integration into the city’s solid waste management system as stakeholders;
- To verify, record, and quantify Waste Picker contribution to waste minimisation by collecting statistics of recyclable materials collected by Waste Pickers;
- To have accurate records of the number of Waste Pickers that can be used for planning programmes, selection of people to access different opportunities such as training etc. This will ensure that the process is fair and transparent and it can be properly monitored to make all opportunities equitable;
- To allow for new Waste Pickers to be registered and recognised when they enter the system; and,
- All Waste Pickers (South Africans and documented foreign nationals) will be registered and issued with a Waste Picker’s identity card.
Through these efforts the City continues working to reduce the amount of waste that make it to our landfill sites and create a more sustainable City for future generations.