Two cities of Vietnam and Sri Lanka replicated a Bangladesh model of community based solid waste management approach to turn the organic municipal garbage into fertiliser, officials said in Dhaka on Friday, reports BSS.
The Matale City in the Central Province of Sri Lanka and coastal Qui Nhon city in central Vietnam are to launch demonstration projects based on the Bangladesh’s Waste Concern (WC) model to convert wastes into compost fertiliser, WC officials said.

“Authorities of the two cities were encouraged by our model to improve waste management situation by turning the organic municipal garbage into composts in a simple and cost effective method, involving stakeholders in a close benefit loop,” said Iftekhar Enayetullah, the co-founder of Waste Concern.

He said apart from Vietnam and Sri Lanka, neighbouring India and Pakistan, Peru, South Africa, and Cambodia showed their interests in replicating the model.

The research-based private organisation for the first time in Bangladesh developed the community-based waste management model, which is being replicated in 20 municipal towns and city corporation areas of Bangladesh.
The model was widely appreciated particularly for its community partnership approach to produce quality compost from garbage and earned Waste Concern several international awards.

A five-day UN-ESCAP sponsored workshop in September this year brought the mayors of the two Sri Lankan and Vietnamese cities to Bangladesh to be shown the Waste Concern model for replication in their countries.
A high-powered government committee last month approved a Waste Concern project for Dhaka’s municipal garbage management under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM).

The mechanism derived from the 1992 Kyoto Protocol, under which the signatory developed nations were obligated to pay for reduction of emission of green house gases in developing countries.

The National CDM Committee and Waste Concern officials said this would be the first CDM project on waste composting in the world expected to be operative from mid 2005 and from the very beginning it would be capable of handling 50 percent of the garbage produced in the city.

The National CDM Board, headed by the principal secretary to the prime minister, Dr. Kamal Siddiqui gave its nod to the project and it now requires a memorandum of understanding with Dhaka City Corporation (DCC).

This project will help Bangladesh to harness the opportunity of attracting foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in waste management without any financial obligation from the host country, officials said.