There is a lot of waste that reaches the roadside bin (each household generates almost 1/2 to 1 kg. of garbage per day). With increasing population in Pune city the amount of waste generated has also increased so much that it cannot be easily disposed of by conventional methods such as land-filling. Dumping poses a number of health and sanitation problems for the locality and the waste pickers. Non-segregation of waste is also the principle reason why biogas plants of the PMC are not able to run to full capacity. Thus, to overcome garbage issues, PMC, SWaCH and Janwani (a social initiative wing of the Mahratta Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Agriculture) are jointly implementing the project that urge citizens to segregate the waste before handing it over to the collectors.
In this phase, garbage containers were removed recently from Karve Road (ward number 36). Residents of Karve Road area will not be able to dump garbage in the large containers which are frequently seen lying on the road sides. Besides they would be required to strictly segregate it into wet and dry waste, which will then be collected from their doorsteps before being disposed off at the nearest biogas plant.
The main objective of this project is to reduce, reuse and recycling of the garbage. It is long term system which involves citizens. Citizens just need to segregate the waste before handing it over to the collectors.
This change is part of the “Zero Garbage Ward Model” which has been implemented in 11 wards across the city. The “Zero Garbage Ward Model”, which was first introduced as a pilot project in Katraj in February 2011, will be extended to nine other wards in the next few months.
