If the NSWMA can succeed in Cassava Piece…

Some time ago the executive director of National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA) Mr Audley Gordon used quite delicate language to acknowledge, in a media interview, that Jamaicans can be filthy in disposing of garbage.

“Improper disposal of solid waste [is] strongly ingrained in Jamaica’s culture,” Mr Gordon told Thomson Reuters and was later quoted in Global Recycling magazine discussing waste disposal in Jamaica.

The NSWMA boss could have used far more indelicate language that few could credibly contest because our history of garbage disposal is awful and it permeates the entire society, lest any one believes that it is only in inner-city communities.

No wonder that the announcement a fortnight ago by the authority of a renewed thrust to get communities to stop dumping garbage in gullies, beginning with Cassava Piece in St Andrew, failed to make the headlines, the talk shows, or social media.

The NSWMA, led by Operations Director Aretha McFarlane, conducted a walk-through of the low-income community, followed by a stakeholders’ meeting to address the persistent issue of illegal garbage dumping in Cassava Piece, but especially in its perpetually rubbish-strewn gully.

Ms McFarlane lamented that, despite sustained efforts by Metropolitan Parks and Markets, “such as public education initiatives, placement of garbage drums, deployment of environmental wardens, and increased garbage collection, the problem persists”. She also highlighted the related health and environmental hazards.

Ms McFarlane did not say anything we didn’t all know when she pointed out that garbage in gullies often pollute the marine environment, in particular contaminating the fish which we later consume, and causing other health risks such as rat infestation, which can lead to the deadly leptospirosis disease.

NSWMA announced it would be take the re-sensitisation campaign from Cassava Piece to other areas across the island and would employ environmental wardens to monitor waste disposal and ensure compliance with proper waste management practices.

What many might not know is that Jamaica’s production of municipal, industrial, commercial, and institutional solid waste reached a massive 1,475,473 tons in 2021/22, according to the latest figures from the Development Bank of Jamaica.

At the same time, the NSWMA, which managed only eight disposal sites, admitted that “correspondingly, there was an uptick in the incidence of illegal dumping across the island, with 388 reported dump sites identified against 288 reported in 2020/2021”.

We are encouraged to hear another recent announcement by the NSWMA that it is leveraging technology to improve waste management operations, increase efficiency, and promote sustainability.

Ms McFarlane says the authority has invested in smart solutions to improve service delivery, improve waste-collection efficiency, and is using vehicle-tracking devices and time-stamped photos to see real-time operations of its trucks.

This technology, she tells us, is also being utilised in its fleet management system to keep track of each unit, monitor fuel usage, and indicate the length of time the unit takes to clear each community of waste. It will be able to send alerts once a unit goes off schedule and assist in fuel savings.

Success by the NSWMA will mean a cleaner, healthier, more garbage-free Jamaica, for which they will need all our support.