Segregate and compost for a Swachh Chennai

The Chennai corporation’s misplaced idea of not involving the community in waste management process is what pushed it down the Swachh Bharat rank list. As the old saying goes, you need two hands to clap. The government or the corporation needs the support of people to handle waste efficiently.

 

Currently, the weakest link in the chain of waste management is source segregation. It is non-existent. If waste can be segregated, around 95 per cent of it can be converted to wealth. For instance, kitchen waste can be composted. I grow around 1,500 plants in my apartment by using composted kitchen waste.

 

Before the entry of private waste disposal agents like Onyx or Ramky, Exnora was doing a good job of getting Chennaiites to segregate wastes. The private players, predictably, do not encourage segregation as their payment is per tonnage.

 

So what happens is that usefulness of such waste like debris, which I see as a nuisance free waste because you can use it to patch up, level or relay roads, is lost and it is merely used to fill up precious landfill space.

 

What the corporation lacks is vision, rather it is driven by its desire to plug holes for the interim. It exposes the ad hocism plaguing the civic body. No real effort is made despite the fact that the corporation is blessed with abundant social capital. The corporation should learn to count on Chennaiites to help them. As far as toilets are concerned, the corporation should remove the stigma around a public toilet. Its image as a dirty place should be corrected.

 

I would suggest building a one-storey multi-purpose hall-cum-toilet. The hall above could be used to teach vocation courses for women and children, as a place to get together for the women in the evening, as a tuition centre for school-going children, as an indoor game centre for youngsters and as a homeless shelter in the night.

 

Maintenance of these toilets should be given to the community where it is located so that a sense of belonging prevails. The human waste from the toilet can also be used for other purposes.

 

In Devadanam area of Trichy, Exnora has built and handed out operations of a modular toilet to the local self-help group. What is required is a little bit of will from the decision-making heads.