Uganda’s National Cleaning Days present a welcome opportunity to improve public health, strengthen environmental responsibility and restore pride in our communities. They also have the potential to support businesses and create employment within a better-organised waste economy.
However, their success will depend on what happens before, during and after the cleaning exercise.
Waste removed from a road, market or drainage channel does not simply disappear. Where will it be taken? Was it separated? Can any of it still be reused or processed? If mixed waste is merely transported to poorly managed dumpsites, we may improve one location while shifting the environmental and economic burden elsewhere.
At dumping sites, exposed organic waste releases methane as it decomposes. Birds and animals scatter waste and ingest plastics or contaminated materials. Polluted runoff can seep into surrounding soil and water, while mixed waste becomes more difficult and expensive to recycle or compost.
This is why National Cleaning Days should be guided by the 5Rs: refuse unnecessary materials, reduce waste generation, reuse what remains useful, recycle suitable materials and recover value from what cannot be reused or recycled. Disposal should be the last option.
The economic opportunity will vary across Uganda. Cities generate concentrated volumes of waste that can support larger processing facilities. Municipalities and trading centres may be better suited to aggregation and composting, while in rural communities, collection points around markets, schools, health facilities and community centres may be more practical than costly centralised systems.
The key question for every locality should be: What waste do we generate, how much of it is recoverable, and who can use it?
Kampala illustrates the scale of the challenge. The city generates more than 2,500 tonnes of solid waste every day.
A recent Kampala Capital City Authority project document estimates that about 85 per cent of this waste is organic, while eight per cent is plastic.
At the time the Kiteezi landfill closed, only around 1,200 tonnes were being collected and deposited there daily.
These figures reveal more than an environmental challenge. They point to potentially valuable materials that remain outside an organised recovery system.
Still, waste does not become valuable simply because it has been collected. Organic waste mixed with plastics, sanitary waste and chemicals cannot easily produce safe compost.
Contaminated plastics may be too costly to recycle. Commercial value depends on sufficient volumes, acceptable quality, affordable transportation and reliable markets.
From working on environmental and community projects, I have learnt that mobilisation is often the easier part. Building a system that continues to function long after a cleaning event is far more difficult.
Other countries offer useful lessons. Rwanda’s Umuganda demonstrates the value of community participation, supported by restrictions on certain plastics and broader waste-management measures.
South Korea combined mandatory waste separation with charges based on the amount of non-recyclable waste discarded. According to the OECD, the country’s municipal waste material recovery increased from 41 per cent in 2000 to 59 per cent in 2014.
Uganda’s approach, however, must reflect our own circumstances.
Government can provide a practical national framework for implementing the 5Rs, while local governments identify waste volumes, collection costs, processors and potential buyers.
Youth, women’s groups and existing waste workers should then be trained and contracted to collect, sort and aggregate materials, rather than being treated merely as unpaid participants.
Companies that place packaging on the market should also contribute to recovering it instead of leaving the full cost to taxpayers.
KCCA’s planned resource recovery facility at Buyala offers Kampala an opportunity to move beyond dumping. In other parts of the country, smaller and decentralised solutions may make better economic sense.
We should therefore measure more than participation. How much waste was reduced, separated or recovered? Which enterprises benefited? How many jobs were created or sustained? What disposal costs and emissions were avoided?
National Cleaning Days can make Uganda cleaner. If they are grounded in the 5Rs and linked to functioning local markets, they can also create businesses, generate employment and unlock lasting economic value.
The author is a Climate Change, Natural Resources and Green Economy Specialist.