The Hindu    28.08.2012

Here’s a renaissance of civic responsibility

Fed up with the garbage contractor’s haphazard and
indifferent attitude to picking up trash, a few residents of the
Renaissance Park apartments in Malleswaram here looked for alternatives
and decided to experiment disposing of waste on their own.

This
was three-and-a-half years ago. Today, 120 households in this apartment
complex segregate their waste, thereby saving the city the bother of
clearing 44 tonnes of garbage annually.

It all started when a few residents, after a brainstorming session, decided to segregate waste on a pilot basis for six months.

Sowmya
Vishwanath, one of the residents in the apartment complex, said: “We
had to figure out a procedure and started the first level of segregation
at the household level.”

Five categories

Each
household was expected to segregate its waste into five categories —
wet waste, biomedical waste, paper, plastic and metal waste — and a
schedule was devised for housekeeping staff. e-waste had to be dropped
off in bins in the basement.

During the first six months, there were block coordinators for the project and instructions were provided to the residents.

Ms. Vishwanath added: “We would draw pie charts and graphs and pin them on the notice board to motivate residents.”

Initial hiccups

Of
course, there were initial hiccups. Ms. Vishwanath said: “We decided
that this process would have to happen collectively. Yet, there were
some people who would take their garbage in the car and throw it outside
the apartment. Sometimes, we would find anonymous bags [thrown out] in
the corridor.”

To make sure everybody adhered to
waste segregation, the apartment’s association decided to be strict with
the residents, making it clear that waste would not be picked up if
they did not segregate it. The association also gave auditing sheets to
the housekeeping staff to monitor where the waste for each house was
being segregated. While some residents felt a sense of pride in carrying
out this activity, others attributed the project’s success to peer
pressure.

Children’s role

Today, for Sukanya, another resident, and her family the process now has become routine.She said: “Children were drivers of this project and helped keep the motivation levels high.”

After
successfully initiating this project, the residents, about a year ago,
moved to the next level: secondary segregation. Ms. Vishwanath said:
“The housekeeping staff further segregates the paper, plastic and metal
waste.

“For instance, paper is divided into
cardboard, notebooks and newspapers. Similarly, plastic is categorised
into bottles and bags. Milk pouches get some value; carton boxes
generate more money than paper. So we realised that secondary
segregation gave us better value for the products and the association
understood the economics of it.”

The money earned
through this has been used to provide incentives for the housekeeping
staff as well as buying paper bags which can be used for disposal of
biowaste products such as diapers, syringes and sanitary pads.

New occupants

The
residents mentioned that today the process has become mandatory and new
occupants in the apartments are briefed on garbage segregation as soon
as they move in. They are told in no uncertain terms the process is
mandatory.