13 Sep 2017

Waste management is  not the sole responsibility of government, but it also calls for individuals accountability, says environmental health academic from the University of Botswana, Dr Bontle Mbongwe.

She was speaking at the South East District Council environment clean-up campaign at Ramotswa Kgotla recently.

Dr Mbongwe said waste management was more than coming up with waste facilities but it was critical that individuals accountability of waste management was cultivated.

“We need to change people’s perceptions on waste management, to convince people to see waste as a resource not a problem,” she added.

She said there was need to empower the community about the danger of producing waste and how it affected their lives and the surroundings.

The University of Botswana academic stated that people never thought about the impact of activities such as burning waste or throwing away plastics, which were unfortunately detrimental to their own livelihoods.

She noted that such actions contributed to some of the non-communicable diseases.

Dr Mbongwe stated that accumulation of waste in oceans was a global concern and added that it was estimated that about 150 million tonnes of plastics had accumulated in the oceans and about 4.6 million tonnes were added every year.

The South East District Council vice chairperson Mr Andrew Mabeo said there was need for rapid response on waste management.

He stated that there was need for collaboration of all stakeholders such as bogosi, government, private companies and village development committees to care for the environment.

Mr Mabeo said there is need for recycling and promotion of products made out of waste as well as coming up with cleanup campaign initiatives in institutions.

Earlier, Chief Representative, Kgosi Buti Mokgosi of Ramotswa said it was upon each individual to make sure that their surrounding was clean, adding that one person’s effort would make a huge difference if each person clean ed their portion. Ends