Only half of the province’s municipalities have submitted plans to reduce mounting organic waste in landfills by the end of the year.
The Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning (DEADP) decided three years ago to institute a 50% reduction of organic waste with the aim of implementing a full ban by 2027 to encourage more recycling measures.
However, the Western Cape government has failed to meet the required target as only 15 of the 30 municipalities in the province submitted their waste diversion strategies.
Councils have blamed the redirection of budgets to Covid-19 strategies for the failure.
It is estimated that more than a quarter of the waste in the landfills is organic. This includes food items and garden waste, among other raw materials.
“Currently 32% of that (waste) is (recycled), which means that there is still 68% of the organic waste that has the opportunity of diversion,” said Saliem Haider, DEADP’s director for waste management.
Weekend Argus previously reported the department’s environmental assessments had revealed a shortage of land suitable for landfill as the province’s 57 sites were near full capacity.
“There is a huge shortage of suitable landfill sites. Sites need to meet strict environmental, social and technical considerations before it can be deemed suitable, and there are very limited parcels of land that meet this requirement.
“Waste minimisation needs to be taken seriously, and circular economy principles need to be taken into consideration,” the department’s Rudolf van Jaarsveldt previously said.
Haider said that the organic waste sent to landfills had a big impact on the environment as it released methane, a greenhouse gas, once decomposed.
“It is a contributing factor to the weather conditions and climate change, and this is a factor in this department prohibiting organic waste going to landfill, amongst others, to reduce methane generation in landfill sites, and create controllable energy opportunities,” he said.
The Organics Recycling Association of South Africa’s (Orasa) chairperson, Melanie Ludwig, said not enough was done to fund waste management in the municipalities across the province.
“They lack the funding, knowledge and capacity to change from a dumping system using landfills to a resource recovery system (recycling) through source separation and material processing through composting or biogas production,” she said.
Ludwig said source separation systems needed to be established for small and big businesses as well.
“The first step is for the City of Cape Town to understand that source separation is the only way to recover and process organic waste (food waste) into a usable new product such as compost or biogas,” she explained.
Mayco member for Urban Waste Management Grant Twigg said the City would contract facilities to extract organic waste from mixed waste streams where possible, through mechanical and biological methods.
“Two organic waste separation plants have already been budgeted for at Athlone and Bellville refuse transfer stations, and others will be considered for other City waste management facilities,” he said.
Twigg said that since 2019, the City had fostered a culture of home composting throughout the metro, with the roll-out of more than 22 500 home composting containers to communities.
“This programme is continuing this year, with approximately 600 containers per subcouncil envisioned to be distributed from 1 July to 31 December.
“The City’s research trials indicated that an average of approximately 17kg organic waste per household per month is diverted through home composting,” Twigg said.
Gavin Heron, chief executive of Earth Probiotic, a food waste management company, said that not only was composting a key strategy for organic waste management, but it also had multiple benefits that included soil health and reducing the use of inorganic fertilisers.
“If we are going to get to a zero-organic-waste-to-landfill by 2027, composting technologies have to be at the forefront of any strategy.
“While converting organic waste to compost might not have a dual benefit of energy like a biogas facility, composting can quickly get to scale inexpensively,” he said.
MEC for Local Government, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning Anton Bredell called on citizens to play their part in managing waste as plans form “an integral part of our overall planning to protect the environment whilst also growing economically”.