By Dr Juliet Kabasiita Kiiza
Uganda's National Cleaning Days present an opportunity to improve public health, strengthen environmental responsibility and restore pride in our communities. They also have the potential to support businesses and create jobs by building a more organised waste economy.
Whether they succeed, however, will depend on what happens before, during and after the cleaning exercise.
Waste removed from roads, markets and drainage channels does not simply disappear. Where will it be taken? Was it separated at source? Can any of it be reused, recycled or processed?
If mixed waste is merely transported to poorly managed dumpsites, we may clean one location while simply 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 contaminates 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 always be the last option.
The economic opportunities created by waste management will differ across Uganda. Cities generate concentrated volumes of waste capable of supporting larger processing facilities. Municipalities and trading centres may be better suited to aggregation and composting, while rural communities may benefit more from strategically located collection points around markets, schools, health facilities and community centres than from costly centralised systems.
The critical question for every locality should be: What waste do we generate, how much of it is recoverable and who can use it?
Kampala illustrates both the scale of the challenge and the opportunity. The city generates more than 2,500 tonnes of solid waste every day. A Kampala Capital City Authority project document estimates that about 85 percent of this waste is organic, while plastics account for another eight percent.
Before the closure of the Kiteezi landfill, only about 1,200 tonnes of waste were being collected and deposited there each day.
These figures reveal more than an environmental problem. They point to valuable materials that remain outside an organised recovery system.
However, waste does not become valuable simply because it has been collected. Organic waste mixed with plastics, sanitary waste and hazardous materials cannot easily produce safe compost. Likewise, contaminated plastics may be too costly to recycle. Commercial value depends on adequate volumes, acceptable quality, affordable transportation and reliable markets.
From my experience working on environmental and community projects, mobilisation is often the easier part. Building systems that continue to function long after a cleaning exercise is far more challenging.
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 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the country's municipal waste material recovery rate increased from 41 percent in 2000 to 59 percent in 2014.
Uganda's approach, however, must reflect its own realities.
Government should provide a practical national framework for implementing the 5Rs, while local governments identify waste volumes, collection costs, processors and potential buyers.
Youth groups, women's organisations and existing waste workers should be trained, supported 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 share responsibility for recovering it instead of leaving the entire cost to taxpayers.
KCCA's planned resource recovery facility at Buyala presents Kampala with an opportunity to move beyond reliance on dumping. Elsewhere in the country, smaller, decentralised waste recovery solutions may prove more practical and economically viable.
Success should therefore be measured by more than participation. We should ask: How much waste was reduced, separated or recovered? Which enterprises benefited? How many jobs were created or sustained? How much was saved in disposal costs, and how many emissions were avoided?
National Cleaning Days can certainly make Uganda cleaner. But if they are grounded in the principles of the 5Rs and connected 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
