KOKMA educates coconut vendors on waste management
Accra, Sept.12, GNA – The Korley Klottey Municipal Assembly (KOKMA) has trained coconut vendors on ways of managing waste at a workshop in Accra.
The workshop, organised in collaboration with Jekora Ventures Limited, a waste management company, aimed at ensuring a clean environment, especially in the Greater Accra Region, where indiscriminate dumping of waste was rampant.
Mr samuel Nii Adjei Tawiah, the Municipal Chief Executive, said sanitation had been a major challenge in the Region and that the initiative would help control the mismanagement of waste as part of measures to make Accra the cleanest city.
He said the Municipal Assembly, together with Jekora Ventures, had met the coconut sellers earlier to discuss how to work towards achieving the goal of a clean city and the importance of coconut husks to economic development.
The MCE said the workshop would not only be held for coconut sellers but would extend to all traders in the Municipality to keep the markets and transport stations clean.
Mr I. B. Nartey-Tokoli, the Managing Director of Jekora Ventures, said there were some waste generators who could not afford to pay the commercial rate the law mandates them to so the Municipality was spearheading the project by identifying the coconut sellers to ensure their activities did not create more waste.
He said the coconut waste was a good raw material for some companies, which used it to produce other useful items including charcoal.
He said the technology those companies used to produce charcoal had lesser impact on the environment and that would also help to reduce the cutting down of trees, which had a negative effect on the environment.
The MCE said it would reduce the huge sum of money government spent to manage waste by using simple scientific processes to deliver quality services.
« The cost effective mechanism and appropriate technology the companies use are affordable for everybody to pay, and the system would not require government to bring in subsidies ».
