Africa has vast resources and the civil society is increasingly gaining power throughout the continent. Political and institutional reforms, though slow, are the great hope for many of the continent's problems, such as the excessive accumulation of waste; a field facing growing challenges and that hardly has any management policies.
In this context we have framed the R&D project IWWA (Integrated Waste Management in Western Africa), which was launched in 2010, having an estimated duration of 2 years - during which GAIKER-IK4 will contribute to improve the integrated waste management systems in West Africa.
The work of GAIKER-IK4, that participates in the project as expert in the fields of recycling and recovery, focuses on the design of the necessary indicators for the evaluation of reuse and recycling processes in the listed countries. The Centre will also participate in the selection of the best practices for management and treatment of solid waste in Europe
and non OECD countries, and they will collaborate in the development of the guidelines for the implementation of integrated waste management systems in the targeted countries.
This project is funded by the European Commission within the 7 Framework Programme and it aims to promote innovative activities in developing countries. The ultimate goal is to promote management policies on regional and national levels involving authorities and other agents (private companies, NGOs, politicians and society in general) in the design of solid waste management policies, such as electric and electronic or plastic waste. These policies will have the support of European and African experts and will focus on Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and Senegal, representative countries of the situation in West Africa in terms of waste management.
Solutions adapted to Africa
The IWWA project, led by the German Technology Centre TTZ Bremerhaven, has the contributions of 19 organisations and institutions, most of them having previous experience in Africa, such as the Environmental Law Research Institute of Nigeria, the NGO Enda Tiers Monde, the United Nations University or GAIKER-IK4 (European referent in research on recycling), among others. Their combined expertise will permit an appropriate assessment of the current situation in the analysed countries, allowing the identification of the main obstacles (technological, sociological, organisational, etc.). Likewise, they will select, within the framework of this research, the best practices and most adequate management systems in Europe and other non-OECD countries (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) for their implementation in the studied countries.
Subject to the results, the consortium will develop tailored tools to provide the best technological and organisational solutions, thus establishing the basis for a framework policy for the future implementation of optimised, sustainable and low-cost waste management systems.