For better waste management

FE Team | Published: April 25, 2009 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

DHAKA city has an area of about 816 square kilometres. For most of the year it is warm with bright sunshine. During the monsoon it gets heavy rainfall. Per capita solid waste generation is quite low. But solid waste management is acute compared to many cities of the developing countries. Daily production of solid waste in the city is more than 4000 metric tons. Of those 200 metric tons of waste generated by hospitals or clinical wastes is a mixture of toxic chemicals, radioactive elements and pathological substances. Of medical wastes, 15 to 20 per cent is highly dangerous. When dumped with other municipal wastes in the open, it poses a serious threat to human health. The nature of solid waste is changing with time and development. Plastics and polyethylene in the waste also cause problems for human health, environment and the drainage system. Because they are cheap and easily available, the users do not care to reuse them.
They even throw these things almost anywhere and everywhere. An Inception Report on Control and Management of Polyethylene bags in Bangladesh shows that people of Dhaka City alone use 600 million bags a day. Floodwaters do not drain quickly due to presence of polyethylene bags in the drainage system. Polyethylene and plastics are not biodegradable. They do not decompose in the natural process. Remaining intact polythene disturbs the flow of nutrients in the soil and hinders sunlight; it destroys the beneficial bacteria needed for soil compaction. In the long run it weakens the foundation of physical infrastructure. Solid waste causes various diseases. Malaria, respiratory problems, eye and skin diseases are the worst impacts, resulting from it in a big city like Dhaka. Contamination of ground water and air are two more adverse impacts.
Solid waste blocks the drainage system to create water logging which facilitates mosquito breeding, bad odour, and other inconveniences. Prone to flooding, undisposed solid waste on the city streets multiplies health problems for the residents. The resultant contaminated ground water and malaria remain the major causes of child mortality. The Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) cannot efficiently remove wastes from the dustbins due to financial and institutional constraints.
A proper understanding of the problem is needed to improve the efficiency of the DCC in this regard.
Mohammad Rajja
Gono Bishwabidyalay,
Gsvmc, Savar , Dhaka
"mahammad raza"