The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Gulu, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | In the ongoing battle against plastic pollution in Gulu City, much attention is given to environmental activists, policymakers, and corporate sustainability efforts. However, an often overlooked group of individuals are making a significant impact: waste collectors.
Across the two divisions of Pece-Laroo and Bardege-Layibi in Gulu city, waste collectors comprising young and the old are working tirelessly daily to collect tons of plastic waste from the streets, drainages, water sources, and the community. While their efforts receive little recognition, they play a crucial role in the plastic pollution fight.
Every morning before dawn, 23-year-old Senkansima Hamad storms several areas, primarily dustbins in bars, markets and restaurants, and drainages within Gulu City, collecting discarded plastic bottles, polythene bags and other non-biodegradable wastes.
Senkansima, who dropped out of senior three in Sembabule district, has been collecting plastic waste in the city for the last five years and says he was driven by the need to earn money due to unemployment and save the environment.
Daily, Senkasima says he collects between 40 to 50 kg of plastic bottles from within the city that he takes to middlemen for sale. A kilogram of plastic bottles at one of the middlemen’s stores in Bardege-Layibi division costs between 500 to 600 shillings, depending on the quality of the bottle.
This means, for Senkasima to earn from a kilogram of plastic bottles, he needs to collect as much as about 50 to 60 bottles.
Despite what he believes is an important role he is playing within the community in addressing plastic pollution, Senkasima says most time people don’t appreciate him and often judge them as mad and a thief.
16-year-old Sunday Kitara, a primary six dropout and resident of Olailong in Bardege-Layibi Division, equally reiterates that he has faced numerous scorns from people who believe he is among local gangs commonly known as Aguu because of collecting plastic bottles.
Kitara says he was driven into collecting bottles firstly because of money after his parents failed to pay for his school fees a year ago. He, however, says now he understands that what he is doing is contributing to plastic waste reduction and saving the environment.
Daily, according to Kitara, he collects five sacks of discarded empty plastic bottles, which earns him about 20,000 to 30,000 shillings.
Both Kitara and Senkasima are among hundreds of waste collectors within the city whose efforts towards plastic reduction and promotion of a clean environment remain essential despite little recognition. They, however, continue to work in poor conditions without safety, low wages and face stigma in society.
Musasizi Kyomuhendo Ntale, one of the agents in Gulu city who buys plastic bottles from waste collectors, acknowledges that many people still don’t recognize the important work they do in saving the environment from plastic pollution.
Ntale notes that due to the nature of their dressings and search for plastic waste in dirty areas, most of them are considered mad and thieves.
According to Ntale, every day, his store receives about 2 tons of plastic waste collected by community collectors and other agents within Gulu City alone, a move he says is helping to clean the environment.
He notes that they have partnered with many recycling companies in the Capital, Kampala, where the plastic wastes collected from Gulu city are transported and turned into reusable products.
For years, Gulu City has been struggling with plastic waste management due to a lack of a recycling plant. This has not only seen the areas littered with plastic waste but also had adverse effects on the soil and public health.
Owing to the plastic waste challenges in the city, in 2022, the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) and CARE Uganda donated a modern waste recycling machine worth 74 million shillings, capable of recycling up to 8 tons of plastic daily.
The processing facility was to be operated through a partnership signed with Green Home Transformation Limited, an entity focused on eliminating plastic pollution in Gulu City. The facility has, however, been lying idle for months.
Bosco Endriko, the Managing Director of Green Home Transformation, told Uganda Radio Network in an interview on Wednesday that the facility hasn’t been operating due to technical challenges with electricity and a breakdown of the store.
He also noted that the facility wasn’t fully equipped with all the machines to complete the processing cycle of plastic, adding that the equipment only performs 30 percent of the recycling processes of shredding plastic into flakes and baling. Endriko said they are optimistic of resuming operation by ethe nd of this month.
According to Endriko, due to inadequate facilities, the entity purchased new equipment for processing plastics into different reusable products with which they are closely working with community collectors.
He emphasized the need to shine a light on the vital roles the community waste collectors, especially the street-connected youths in the city, play in saving the environment within the city and maintaining cleanliness.
Through his entity, Endriko says they have recycled an estimated 30 tons of plastic collected within Gulu City since 2022.
The inadequate processing facilities for plastic materials in Gulu city, however, continue to greatly hamper the fight against plastic pollution. According to an October 30 2024, publication of the Daily Monitor, plastic waste accounted for 20 percent of all waste generated in Gulu city in the 2023/24 Financial Year.
Dr Daniel Okello, the Gulu City Health Officer, acknowledged on Wednesday that the City Council doesn’t have a substantive processing facility despite tons of plastic waste generated daily. Dr Okello says even the modern landfill currently under construction with funding from the German government through GIZ isn’t equipped with a processing facility, although it has a facility that will sort out different categories of waste.
In a bid to manage plastic waste disposal, the City Council has installed metallic plastic collection bins at strategic points within the city center that are emptied periodically for recycling.
In Uganda, plastic pollution has become a significant environmental challenge, coupled with climate change, which poses serious risks to public health and the environment. According to the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) report, the country produces an estimated 600 tons of plastic waste every day, with only 40 percent collected, while 60 percent is left in the environment.
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