Project tackling plastic waste in East Africa and South Asia
SINGAPORE – The Alliance to End Plastic Waste and UN Habitat are working together on a project to reduce plastic waste leakage from municipal waste collection in cities around the world.
The new partnership, which will kick off with projects in six target cities in Eastern Africa and Southern Asia, will use the UN-Habitat Waste Wise Cities (WWC) Tool to map waste flows and assess potential plastic leakage from waste management systems and identify short- and long-term methods to increase the amount of plastic waste collected, recycled and recovered.
The program supports the Alliance’s focus on developing meaningful city projects in high plastic waste leakage communities, and the WWC Challenge to clean up and establish sustainable waste management in 20 cities around the world by 2022.
“For the two billion people worldwide that lack access to waste collection, a significant barrier to establishing an effective municipal solid waste program is lack of data,” said Jacob Duer, president and CEO, Alliance to End Plastic Waste.
“Through our work with the UN Habitat, we’ll provide city leaders for the first time with a comprehensive understanding of their waste management systems, its gaps and solutions for improvement. We expect the work to have an immediate and lasting positive impact on these six cities and hope to use what we learn to scale the program to more urban communities.”
The participating cities include Nairobi and Mombasa in Kenya; Addis Ababa and Bahir Dar in Ethiopia; Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) and Mangalore (Karnataka) in India.
At the conclusion of the program, in ten to twelve months, comprehensive assessments of the waste management practices in the key cities will outline solutions to increase the amount of plastic waste collected and recovered. The assessments may suggest feasibility studies for investments in larger plastic waste management infrastructure.
The partnership will also engage community members and relevant waste chain actors to solve infrastructure gaps and reduce plastic waste leakage in the program cities.
UN Habitat the United Nations agency agency working for a better urban future. It is mandated by the UN General Assembly to promote socially and environmentally sustainable towns and cities with the goal of providing adequate shelter for all.
The Alliance to End Plastic Waste is an international not-for-profit organization partnering with government, environmental and economic development NGOs and communities around the world to address the challenge to end plastic waste in the environment. Through programs and partnerships, we are focused on solutions in four core areas: infrastructure, innovation, education and clean up. As of June 2020, the Alliance has nearly 50 members companies and supporters representing global companies and organizations located through the Americas, Europe, Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.