Experts meet on the Environment

Accra, May 7, GNA - Most African countries would not be able to meet the objectives of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), unless issues relating to sanitation and waste management were tackled more seriously, a former Regional Co-ordinator of the Global Environment Facility said in Accra on Monday.

Professor Oladele Osibanjor, Director, Basel Convention Regional Co-ordinating Centre for Africa

which is based in Nigeria said waste management was a cross-cutting issue that had consequences for all the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which ranged from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS by 2015.

"How can we eradicate poverty and hunger, when people still scavenged rubbish dumps for a livelihood, children use the dump as a play ground and hospitals dump their waste at the same grounds used by the general public" he asked participants attending a three-day workshop on "waste management in Africa.

All these practices had serious implication for achieving the MDGs, Prof. Osibanjor told the workshop which is on the theme: Theory and Practice".

The three-day workshop is being organized by the United Nations University's Institute of Natural Resource in Africa and International Leadership Institute for participants across Africa.

Prof. Osibanjor said the general waste produced by most households were not that harmful, but because developed countries had decided to use Africa as dumping grounds for most of their electronic and electrical waste in disguise, the waste being generated in recent times were harmful because they had a lot of toxic substances.

"Most African nations have become dumping ground for used phones, computers, batteries, tyres and other gadgets that have hazardous substances and needed to be disposed off properly and not in the way that was presently being handled by most African countries," he said. Prof. Osibanjor said most African countries were not practicing waste management but rather waste disposal, because till date, there was no sorting out and neither was the waste converted into any profitable venture but mixed up and dumped at a particular site.

This kind of dumping cannot continue for a very long time because land was becoming a scare commodity in most cities with some people already such old dump site for the construction of their building, irrespective of the health implication, he said. Prof. Osibanjor, who is also a professor in chemistry said cancer cases were on the increase because of waste disposal issues citing the use of car types for the burning of animal hides for consumption as an example.

He called on government to put in place legislation that would ensure that waste was properly managed and disposed of in ways that would not pose danger to the population.

He also called on the private sector to invest in waste management to help the continent meet the challenges of the MDG since with a collaborative attitude by all stakeholders much would be achieved. Mr Poku Adusei, Deputy Minister of Local Government, Rural Development and Environment in a speech read on his behalf said Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDA) spent over 15 per cent of their District Assemblies Common Funds and their internally generated funds on managing waste generated in their communities. He said in addition to that government supported most MMDA with monies from the HIPC Funds and other donor contributions for the management of waste.

Mr Adusei said though the Ministry had the mandate for ensuring sound waste management, achieving the goal required the collective effort of all, including the private sector and academia.