NEMA calls on city, municipal authorities to expedite enforcement of waste management regulations
The National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) has called on city and municipal authorities to expedite the enforcement of the national environment waste management regulations 2020 to address the persistent challenges of solid wastes within the urban areas.
The regulations task manufactures or processors of a product packed in plastics to take back or collect the waste - a task that has been ignored by most manufacturers.
Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) spends billions of shillings every financial year to clean up litter on the city’s roads, green parks as well as open up choked drainage systems and sewer lines.
In addition to the direct cost of clearing the litter, poor waste management also harms the environment.
The most common types of litter in Kampala are food packaging, plastic bottles, cans, polythene bags locally referred to as kaveera, papers and electronic parts.
These litters remain on the Ugandan streets or residential streets until KCCA or contractors’ trucks collect them. And in case of delays, whenever it rains running water washes it away to the drainage system.
In 2020 the government passed the National Environment Waste Management regulations which calls for beverage producers to extend responsibility to collect back solid wastes generated by their products but there is little implantation of this law.
NEMA mandated to supervise waste disposals among urban authorities wants the regulations heeded to.
With the problem of poor waste disposal being national, NEMA also wants urban authorities nationwide to criminalise common littering by persons and institutional damping using the national environmental act 2019.
Under this law a person found littering is liable to 11years imprisonment while institutions could pay over 100 million shillings in fines.
Besides enforcing the laws, NEMA has embarked on sensitisation of the masses against poor waste disposal.
