Sanitation and Waste Management in the DRC: A Great Challenge
With 84% of its population lacking access to basic sanitation services, the DRC faces mounting waste and health crises. A recent exchange visit to Sweden offered Congolese experts practical solutions and renewed determination on how to battle the challenges.
"I understand now much better the challenges of waste treatment, and specially the importance of a proper classification to account for materials that are hazardous to health and the environment", said Donat Mukandila, a logistician of the Congolese implementation team of the AGIR project, in the team’s visit to Sweden.
During the week-long trip, the delegation of eight professionals visited, participated and engaged in dialogue with Swedish citizens, institutions, and private sector actors of the waste management system from household waste to industrial waste.
Despite abundant water resources, the DRC faces serious deficits in sanitation and access to safe drinking water.
The sanitation and waste management situation is characterized by low service coverage, about 84% of the population lacks access to basic sanitation services, according to the World Bank. A consequence of that is a massive waste accumulation, including plastic, household, and industrial waste which are discarded in both rural and urban environments with serious impacts for economics and health, like cholera which remains a major problem.
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Likasi city. Waste piled along the riverside in the city center.
The waste management situation in the six partner municipalities of SALAR Internationals project AGIR is serious, and local authorities have expressed the need to act with available resources. For this reason, the AGIR team took time to understand the Swedish waste treatment model, which is a global reference in waste management, and look for examples of pertinent and applicable practices in the framework of AGIR project.
Raising awareness is the key to improve waste management
First, the Congolese team visited a private home where they took part in separating the different types of household waste, then they disposed of them in the designated containers located in the apartment building in Stockholm. They understood “the need for waste management to begin at home with everybody implicated, not only the women”, said Aurélie Anamonga, gender expert of the AGIR’s team.
This idea was confirmed with the visit to the Östberga Recycling Center, one of the recycling centers operated by the Municipality of Stockholm, serving as a public facility where residents can dispose of most types of household waste that do not go in regular trash bags, like solid waste, electronics, batteries, metals, and including dangerous waste. The waste is treated and recycled in large quantities.
“Despite the heavy rain we observed residents arriving by car to dispose of their waste; old furniture, beds, televisions, batteries and much more. They really own the concept of well-being and are actively applying it", said Christian Karis, provincial Chief of Decentralization in Haut-Kantanga province.
A floating recycling center at the dock: Stockholm’s innovative waste collection service
The final proof of the importance of population awareness came when the AGIR’s team went to Nämdö island, where the inhabitants have created a cooperative searching for solutions as there are no daily municipal services.
That Saturday, an annual service provided by Värmdö municipality arrived at the island: a recycling boat designed to collect non-organic waste in the Stockholm archipelago. The vessel docked at Nämdö, and residents from surrounding islands came with their furniture and household things that they had been storing all year, waiting for the arrival of the boat “Obelix”.
“It is, no doubt, a matter of awareness and education”, said Georges Tshimpuki, a Congolese expert in local governance and mining, “we must begin in schools and launch campaigns that help the population to understand and demand proper waste treatment”. “And that treatment must be part of long-term planning, beyond political mandates and leaders, and we also have to work on that with our partner municipalities”, added Benjamin Kasonga, economist and financial analyst of the AGIR Team.
The AGIR team helped load furniture and other items for recycling.