New dispensation for waste pickers
INTEGRATION: MUNICIPALITIES TO WORK WITH THEM
aste pickers are set to get a better deal in terms of new guidelines for municipalities to formally integrate them into the waste management system.
Waste pickers are estimated to collect 80 to 90% of discarded packaging and paper in the country, according to a report by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. It was estimated this saved municipalities hundreds of millions of rands for landfill space, yet waste pickers get very little for the recyclables they sell.
Now, the department of environmental affairs has come up with guidelines for municipalities to formally integrate waste pickers into the waste management system. These were presented to municipalities, private companies, waste pickers’ associations, civil society organisations and academics at a workshop in Pretoria last week.
“The department and stakeholders developed the draft guidelines to recognise the key role played by waste pickers in the recycling economy and to ensure their conditions, incomes and positions in the value chain are improved as the recycling economy is expanded,” said researcher Melanie Samson.
The department’s waste management director, Dumisani Buthelezi, said the first step was to register all waste pickers in the country. The department also planned to educate enforcement agencies about the rights of waste pickers as “metro police often abuse them”. Another problem was closure of landfills. Buthelezi said municipalities would convert closed landfill sites into buyback centres and sorting spaces for waste pickers.
Luyanda Hlatshwayo, a waste picker in Johannesburg, said he doubted the guidelines would be implemented. “These plans and policies happen at a national level, but the officials responsible for direct implementation do the opposite. We don’t have faith that much will change for waste pickers and even if it does, it will take a very long time.”
He said many of the plans presented at the workshop had been raised by waste pickers years ago.
“We’ve been asking the City of Joburg to change the bylaws for a long time and only now are they willing. We are of the view this is happening because it’s election time.” –