How trash can be an urban money-spinner

As a child growing up in Lagos, Nigeria, in the late 1990s, I remember women roaming through my community and chanting in Yoruba,

This translates as “The bottle peddler is here! We buy rubber sandals and leaky (aluminum) pots.” Some families would separate their waste, because they could give some of it to these women for cash. There are far fewer of these peddlers now, perhaps because bottling companies are no longer recycling the bottles women gather. But a large-scale effort along these lines to monetise waste in Lagos, if properly coordinated and funded, could potentially have a huge impact on the city’s garbage problem. And what works in Lagos could hold lessons for many other cities, not only in the developing world.

In Lagos, action is urgently needed. The city has a population of about 22 million and, as the World Bank has highlighted, is heavily polluted. Especially in poorer areas, residents who can’t afford to pay for waste collection come out in the dead of night to dump their garbage on the streets or in the water. As a result, the city’s slums are littered with paper, household waste, and plastics.

Outsourcing most of the actual waste collection and management could be a solution for countries around the world. But much more needs to be done. Unless people are given incentives to monetise their garbage and minimise the amount that reaches landfills, the pollution problem will continue to fester. Three options in particular look promising.

For starters, countries could introduce a greenexchange programme like in the city of Curitiba in Brazil. There, residents bring their waste to designated centres in exchange for bus tickets or food. This way, there would be less garbage, roads would be less clogged, and people wouldn’t need to wait for waste trucks. In addition, households would be more likely to separate waste if the city gave food stamps or fruit to those that recycled a certain amount of metal, clean plastic, or oil waste, for example.

Second, countries could reduce its plastic waste by working more closely with bottling companies and other manufacturers. This could involve public-private partnerships that require each company to operate a recycling centre where consumers can bring used plastics. Citizens will feel motivated to recycle their plastic waste at centres bearing recognisable brand names, especially if a reward programme is involved. Introducing such schemes would certainly help cut the amount of plastic waste that is generated or discarded.

Lastly, campaigns to raise environmental awareness would encourage better waste management. Showcasing ordinary citizens being mindful of waste and their environment in everyday life can inspire others to do the same. Creative and locally relevant approaches would work well almost anywhere.

That includes all countries where the waste problem hits particularly hard. To address it, we should create the right incentives, as the bottle peddlers in my part of the city did two decades ago. Monetising waste will encourage poorer communities to participate, and awareness campaigns can help to show just how easy it is to be green. The result will be a cleaner, more livable city that serves as an example for others to follow.