MARGAO: The Margao Municipal Council has finally decided to launch a major drive on the solid waste management from the first week of February in a bid to ensure that segregation of waste takes place at source.
With the Sonsodo waste dumping site coming under the scanner of the National Green Tribunal and the Sociedade de Fomento serving a preliminary notice of termination on the civic body, Margao Municipal Chairperson Babita Angle Prabhudesai on Friday said the Municipality will launch a major exercise from February first week on the solid waste management. “The civic body has put in place a plan of action, including creation of sectors, appointment of supervisors and deployment of vehicles in a bid to streamline waste collection at source from the first week of February,” Babita told the media after the special meeting on Friday.
She said the municipality will launch a major publicity drive in the coming week to reach the message of waste segregation at source right inside the households and commercial establishments.
“We have finalised a plan of action on the publicity front. Advertisements will be inserted in the media including the print and electronic media to ensure the message of waste segregation at source reaches the households. We have decided to come out with coloured fliers with an appeal to the households on how to go about waste segregation at source and the benefits of waste segregation,” she said.
In this connection, the chairperson disclosed plans to distribute one bucket to each of the 40,000 households, besides a bag to store dry waste.
“The Council has already sent our requisition to the office of the Director of Municipal Administration to provide us the buckets, bins, manpower and other logistics support required to take the waste segregation at source initiative to its logical conclusion,” she said, adding that workers engaged in door-to-door workers collection of waste are being imparted training for effective handling of
the waste.
The regional committee of the NGT headed by Justice Deodhar had pulled up the Margao Municipal Council for its inept handling of the Sonsodo site with tons of waste in unsegregated form being transport to the site everyday.
Sociedade de Fomento Industrial Ltd had last week served a preliminary notice of termination on the Margao civic body over its failure to clear the payments amounting to Rs 11.45 crore and the utter failure of the Municipality to supply segregated waste to the waste treatment plant at Sonsodo.
