Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs Ms Edna Molewa has published the National Domestic Waste Collection Standards which will come into effect on Tuesday, 1 February 2011.
The National Domestic Waste Collection Standards published under the National Environmental Management: Waste Act (Act No. 59 of 2008) aims to provide a uniform framework within which domestic waste should be collected in South Africa.
This comes after a consultative process with provinces, municipalities and the general public in order to redresses the past imbalances in the provision of waste collection services. The standards aim to guide municipalities on how to provide acceptable, affordable and sustainable waste collection service to the human health and the environment.
The standards covers the levels of service, separation at source (between recyclable and non-recyclable materials), collection vehicles, receptacles, collection of waste in communal collection points, and most importantly the frequency of collection.
Non recyclable material such as perishable food waste must be collected at least once a week and recyclable material such as paper, plastic, glass etc; must be collected once every two weeks. Municipalities have a choice to provide different types of bins taking into consideration the type of vehicles they use; however, they must be rigid and durable to prevent spillage and leakage.
The development of the standards took into consideration the existing innovative practices at local government level across the country and seeks to build on what has already been achieved whilst emphasising a need to separate recyclable and non recyclable domestic waste and the protection of human health and the environment.
A copy of the standards can be obtained online by clicking on the link: http://www.environment.gov.za//Documents/Documents/2011Jan31/domestic_weastecollection_standards.pdf or at http://www.sawic.org.za or from the department's offices at 2nd floor North Tower, Fedsure Forum Building, 315 Pretorius Street, Pretoria, 0001 or by e-mailing info@sawic.org.za.
For media enquiries contact:
Albi Modise
Cell: 083 490 2871
E-maill: amodise@environment.gov.za
Lucky Sindane
Cell: 072 188 9216
E-mail: lsindane@environment.gov.za
