Thiruvananthapuram: Local Self-Government Minister K.T. Jaleel has said that the government would soon direct the local bodies to spend 10 per cent of their annual budget on waste management and disposal activities. He said the local bodies were spending the bulk of their funds for construction of roads and bridges which was not acceptable. The local bodies need to take waste disposal activities on priority.
With most of the municipalities and the panchayats in the state yet to recognise the pressing need for garbage disposal plants at the local level, infectious diseases and contamination of water resources continue to pose serious threat to the people.
A large number of municipalities are yet to construct small waste disposal plants or put in place effective garbage disposal mechanism at the local level. The government is opposed to setting up centralised huge plants for waste disposal.
The situation in panchayats is no better. Of the nearly 1000 panchayats, not even half have effective waste disposal mechanism.
Though the previous LDF government had launched a state-wide drive under the total sanitation programme and had even focused on common facilities and biogas plant on subsidy in households, the project could not achieve success on expected lines. But experts say the best way for the state is to manage the waste at the source itself.
In urbanised panchayats, those having five to six cents of land can have their own treatment mechanism for managing biodegradable waste and common collection centres can be set up for non-biodegradable waste. Given the increasing incidence of infectious diseases, many feel that it’s time for the government to put in place a multi-pronged strategy to fight the garbage problem.
