Senior research fellow at Institute of Environment and Sanitation Studies, Dr. Dzidzo Yirenya-Tawiah
Ghana may be fighting a losing battle against indiscriminate dumping of solid waste if the government does not consider establishing more transfer stations.
This is according to a senior research fellow at the Institute of Environment and Sanitation Studies of the University of Ghana, Dr. Dzidzo Yirenya-Tawiah.
She says that the limited number of waste transfer stations has rendered the collection of waste by household refuse collectors, popularly known as Borla Taxis, very ineffective.
According to her, some of these operators resort to dumping at unapproved places as they either do not know where to dump the waste or are unwilling to travel long distances.
Dr. Yirenya-Tawiah believes that with more transfer stations, Borla Taxi operators will have a better turnaround in terms of waste collection and be more efficient in cleaning the environment.
She wants the government to consider establishing waste transfer stations in Municipalities.
“The Achimota transfer station is still running but these days they are open to having the trucks come to dump and so in the process, the informal waste collectors don’t have the opportunity in terms of numbers. There are a few numbers that are dumping because the trucks are also coming in. Because of that, they would have to go and wait for long hours to be able to dump at the transfer station. Is it possible that at the Municipal Assembly level, can we have such transfer stations if we can’t have waste disposal sites?
Can we have such transfer stations that these informal waste collectors can go and dump at that point? That’s something we should be looking at because finding land is difficult but where we are able to find a smaller piece of land, that will help the Borla Taxi collectors a lot. In fact, that is one of the major reasons why we have this indiscriminate dumping,” Dr. Dzidzo Yirenya-Tawiah said on the You and Environment Show on Radio Univers 105.7FM.
National President of the Borla Taxis Association, Madam Lydia Bamfo agrees with the suggestion.
She mentioned that Accra has just about four waste transfer stations.
Meanwhile, Lydia Bamfo wants Ghanaians to change their attitude to the operations of household refuse collectors.
She complained that most of the operators were not being accorded the necessary respect.
