The scant resources for organic composting at the disposal of the authorities is affecting waste collection in urban areas. This has led to the proliferation of unhygienic civic conditions
Organic composting is assuming an ever-increasing significance in today’s world, as the disposal of increasing quantities of urban solid waste becomes a major challenge for municipal authorities. While Governments and NGOs in India are recycling the organic component of solid waste, inorganic waste such as glass and metals are recycled by the informal sector.
The common means of composting being used here is the ‘windrows method’; the Supreme Court’s committee for solid waste management in the country endorses the windrows concept when large quantities of waste have to be handled and put through the composting procedure.
However, organic composting in India is apparently not going as per plan. The primary cause is the inefficient segregation of inorganic waste such as glass, plastic and metals from organic waste. This should ideally happen at the source. Composting plants in Delhi and elsewhere can take a leaf out of composting facilities at Suryapet and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh where the output compost met and passed the statutory guidelines of European countries. In these two cities solid waste is segregated at source.
However, in cities like Delhi the problem of inefficient composting is compounded by the fact that the waste segregation drive by the State Governments has failed to take off, and worse still, in situations where the effort of environmentally-aware institutions and homes that are dutifully segregating waste is left ineffective as eventually the segregated waste gets mixed up in the garbage collection trucks. This speaks of the inept manpower and total lack of training and capacity building of the waste handlers.
Most of the failures in composting initiatives are due to a lack of attention at the planning stage in understanding the demand and marketing aspects of the organic manure so generated. In many projects across the country, the lack of technical know-how and its strict implementation is proving to be a pivotal cause in the composting project to suffer losses as well as not perform as per laid down standards. Another crucial aspect that is being ignored is efficient storage practices of the finished product. Take the case of the Bhalswa compost plant in Delhi, where the finished product is stored in the open and thus sacks get damaged and exposed to rains. This results in the nutrients getting washed away.
According to a study conducted by the Indian Institute of Soil Science, Bhopal, most plants do not adhere to the Fertiliser (Control) Order, 1985, guidelines pertaining to physico-chemical properties, fertilising potential and heavy metal polluting potential of solid waste compost in 29 cities. The study found organic matter, nitrogen and phosphorus contents in the compost to be low and heavy metal content high. None of the samples taken were within the FCO limits. Compost samples of Suryapet, Vijayawada and Kanpur were found to be of the prescribed quality.
However, given this scenario, the composting plants featuring in this study and not being able to meet the FCO guidelines, are being lauded instead of being corrected. For instance, the composting plant in Okhla received `25 lakh as carbon credits from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change for processing two lakh tonnes of solid waste into compost through aerobic composting technology.
The Government needs to intervene and ensure that funding and incentives either from the Government or other agencies is directly tied to quality control and achievement of sales targets of organic composting. This alone can help improve the state of affairs at the composting plants and of the quality of their output.
Organic waste composting has its challenges, such as the costly segregation process of separating inorganic from organic waste. In addition to this, the availability of scant resources at the disposal of the authorities is affecting waste collection in cities. This has led to unhygienic civic conditions and health hazards for the communities in urban areas.
But the Government needs to understand the importance of quality operations at all the composting plants, as the organic manure output can be a good avenue for entrepreneurs wanting to market the same.
In addition, organic composting is a sustainable solution to waste management problems and is also a method to reduce quantities of waste by converting organic matter to a safer and useful product that recycles nutrients to enhance long-term soil fertility.
Once the quality parameters of the organic manure are achieved the Government can give a boost to its sales potential by offering incentives in the form of subsidy to farmers and by competitively pricing the manure in the open market. The Government can also partner with NGOs to launch a sustained awareness campaign on the issue in the targeted markets.