KMC to assist waste segregation for a month

By A Staff Reporter Kathmandu, June 18:Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) has urged households and businesses to strictly follow the provision of segregating wastes at the source.

“Since June 15, we have requested public to segregate organic from inorganic wastes. We will assist the public only for a month in segregating the wastes and developing the habit. After a month, we will strictly implement the provision,” said Basanta Acharya,  information officer at KMC.

The KMC has stated that it wouldn’t accept unsegregated wastes from households or businesses.

Many people have already started segregating the wastes to support the KMC´s campaign to keep the city clean.

“We have segregated wastes produced in our household. However, the garbage truck doesn’t arrive timely. Organic wastes are hard to keep within the house for long,” said Aditya Bhandari, a civil engineer living in Sahayoginagar, Kathmandu.

According to Acharya, wastes are being collected timely as dumping process has eased in Sisodol and Bancharedanda. However, the habit of throwing unseparated wastes along the roads and river corridors has made collection of wastes difficult.

“We have been told to inform the public to separate wastes properly when we reach households. But people are throwing wastes along the roads. We cleared piles of wastes from the road yesterday; nevertheless, today morning the scenario was same,” said a garbage worker who was collecting wastes from New Baneshwor’s junction on Friday.

A shopkeeper nearby also stressed that people were throwing wastes along the road either during late night or early morning.

“Throwing wastes along the roads have been a serious issue for long. KMC has time and again tried to mitigate the problem but failed. However, we plan to bring strict laws to discourage the habit,” said Acharya.

The objective of Environment Audit Report, 2015, on Solid Waste Management of KMC was to segregate decaying and non-decaying waste at its source and composting the decaying waste at household, community and municipal level. Alongside bringing a strict policy for waste segregation, KMC officials informed that they will monitor every possible places with CCTVs and take action against individuals throwing wastes in open.

“KMC is moving forward to keep the city clean. It has been nine years since KMC requested public to separate wastes and many more years have passed asking them not to throw wastes in roads. We now plan to implement provisions of punishment and fines strictly since July 17,” said Acharya.

Acharya also added that the KMC will collect problems faced by locals to separate wastes during the one-month period.

“Many have started separating the wastes while some are facing problems. We are discussing ways to address the problems and find a long-term solution. We are determined to implement waste separation and keep Kathmandu clean,” Acharya told The Rising Nepal.