Lagos State commissioner for the environment, Babatunde Adejare, says the ongoing reform in solid waste management sector under the Cleaner Lagos Initiative (CLI), which is to roll in first week of July, will boost the economy of the state and enhance the living conditions of the residents.
Under the initiative backed with the recently signed unified Lagos environmental law, the state government is handing over the responsibility of domestic waste collection to a multinational waste services company, expected to bring in some 600 compactors and 900,000 electronically tracked bins.
The state is also introducing a monthly public utility levy to be paid by tenement and managed by an Environmental Trust Fund (ETF).
To support the collection operations, three transfer loading stations in Agege, Oshodi and Simpson, and three waste depots in Mushin, Ogudu and Simpson are to be concessioned with the aimed to remodelling and retrofitting the facilities to world-class standards.
Adejare, briefing journalists as part of activities marking the second anniversary of current administration, said the solid waste management sector had been identified as critical to the realisation of the vision of Governor Akinwunmi Ambode-led government to position Lagos as a clean, healthy and liveable state.
“Current realities in this sector reveal deficiencies across the entire process chain, from insufficient collection services, to inefficient transportation methods, and abysmal disposal practices that are not only wasteful in terms of resource utilisation but also injurious to environmental and public health,” he said.
The commissioner said that Lagos in its 50 years of existence had grown exponentially in population thereby impacting on solid waste management and sanitation as a whole, adding that at present the daily waste generation in the state officially stood at 13,000 metric tonnes.
Faced with the challenge of urbanisation, the state government had to think unconventionally and come up with a model that will not only prioritise sanitation but also create the enabling environment for private participation.
According to Adejare, by devolving the provision of solid waste management services to the private sector, the Clean Lagos Initiative will birth a new financially viable and technology-driven sub-sector to the Lagos economy, creating new businesses and job opportunities that can be emulated by other states in the country.
