POLYTHENE! An Asset or a Liability?

Tackling the Menace of Filth in Our Beloved Cities

Governments over the years in Ghana have found it very difficult to tackle the menace of filth in our cities and this have left very sour tastes in our mouths whenever we travel to and from our various destinations through our cities. We often find ourselves surrounded by hills and mountains filth wherever we go and even in the heart of the city of Accra breathing becomes a sort of a punishment because the air we breathe stinks of rotten garbage! When you ask people why this is so, they simply shrug and say “AMA is responsible for this!”, “Oh AMA is a useless agency and I wonder why we keep on spending the tax payers money on them”, “The Mayor of Accra is incompetent!”, “The Atta Mills Government is just chopping money and doing nothing!”.

People are simply peeved at the way there seems to be no way of solving this menace and they simply throw up their arms into the air in despair. How and who can solve this problem for Ghana? This is the question I ask myself whenever this issue crosses my mind and I believe most Ghanaians do same.

Harlem is a suburb in New York City of the USA, which is described as a slum. It might interest you to note that Harlem has places which are even worse off than certain parts of Nima in the city of Accra which is also described as a slum. Sodom and Gomorra can be best described as the Mother of all slums in Accra but the solution to this problem in my opinion boils down to a question of the availability of Money which the Government of Ghana seems not to have in abundance (at least that’s what they say all the time … No Money!). In my humble opinion, there is no amount of Government or individual effort to try to change the mind set of the masses about keeping their surroundings clean will make any difference otherwise Harlem in New York will not be described as a slum. By the way, why are these places which I have mentioned described as slums in the first place? I believe that It’s because of the kind of people who live there together with the way they manage their surroundings. The people who live in these areas are simply hungry, diseased, poverty stricken and unemployed so they cannot take good care of their surroundings and thus it’s filthy and stinky! That’s the plain and simple truth of the matter.

Beverly Hills on the other hand is also suburb in California also in the USA. What do we find? Clean streets with nicely mowed lawns and water sprinklers working 24 hours a day. Almost all the houses have swimming pools, very beautiful gates with sophisticated alarm systems, many cars and armed guards. Some people describe this place as Cloud 9 or Heaven on Earth. The Airport residential area, the Manet Courts and Trasacco Estates and perhaps East Cantonments and a few other areas in Accra can also be “compared” with Beverly Hills. Yes, the people who live here are simply filthy rich and so they can spare off a few dollars or GH Cedis to keep their surroundings clean and the air is pleasant to breathe. This is also another plain and simple truth of the matter.

Let’s compare other places like Soweto in South Africa. What do we see there? Is this place described as a slum? What about down town Janak-Puri in New Delhi? Is it also a slum? Compare them with Singapore and the residential areas of Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. Why am I making these comparisons? It’s all because these places either lack the kind of people and the funds to make them filthy and smelly or on the other hand beautiful and pleasant to live in. For me, it all boils down to MONEY!! “Money, Money, Money is a rich man’s world” … So says the musical group ABBA in one of their hit singles. With cash as a tool in the pocket of any individual, they can make a place clean and pleasant to live in. This is also a fact! The Holy Bible also tells us that “Money answereth all Things”.

Now let us take a look at the city of Accra as a case study. I live in a suburb of Accra called Teshie-Nungua Estates and I am grateful to God to be privileged to have a good enough job as a middle class Ghanaian. I own a small mortgaged flat and by the Grace of God I can afford to buy a rubbish bin and also pay for refuse collection once a week. I pay close to GH¢10.00 (US$7.00) a month for refuse collection and so my area does not stink of filth because we can afford to keep it clean. The same applies to other similar areas where people can collectively afford to do so.

First of all, it is unfortunate that areas with a high population density like Nima, James town, Osu RE, La township, Korlegono, Kaneshie, Teshie and Nungua township, Accra Central, Sodom and Gomorra, Medina township, Ashaiman township to mention a few are areas mostly inhabited with low income people (except for the residential areas) who cannot even afford one balanced meal a day. Majority of the people pay rents of between GH¢6 - 10.00 a month for a single room excluding water and electricity and earn an average income of about GH¢25.00 (US$20.00) a month or less. These people can definitely not afford to pay for refuse collection like I do and so what would we expect of them? Their refuse including human waste will be thrown away into the gutters in the dead of night or at dawn. These are disposed off in Polythene bags. Some of these people do not have bath rooms in their homes and so they take a shower on the streets and attend to natures call at the beaches or in the surrounding bushes because they cannot either pay for public toilet facilities or these facilities don’t exist. These are the people who generate most of the city of Accra’s mountain of refuse each day.

Secondly, another point to consider is the fact that because these people cannot afford decent meals which are quite expensive, they fall on the good old kenkey and fried fish. Kenkey is a staple meal in Ghana and relatively inexpensive, but it generates a lot of refuse because of the corn leaves used to prepare it. Another staple meal is fufu and soup (the soup could be quite expensive depending on what type of meat or fish you choose to prepare it) but is relatively cheap to afford. Cassava and plantain also generates a lot of refuse and disposal becomes a problem if there are no goats or sheep around to feed on the waste. Collectively, these high population density areas generate a lot of refuse daily and this overwhelms the entire city's ability to manage the waste. Incidentally, Accra Central is the hub of the city’s commercial activities and so thousands of people converge there every day and it is estimated that Accra Central accommodates close to 3.5 million people daily and these people generate waste which has to be managed at all cost if the city must be kept clean! Herein lays the magnitude of the problem.

Thirdly, the feeding habits of most Ghanaians are the main source of huge refuse generation because most of our food is sold in its raw form. In most advanced countries food is sold in semi or completely processed form and this takes care of about 70% of the waste as compared to unprocessed food. Why do I say this? Most people in Ghana find it much cheaper to eat outside than cooking at home. Mind you, I am not talking about eating from restaurants but I am talking about places like "Antie Esi's special rice" or "Odo rice corner” The meals are served hot and are wrapped in Polythene bags as "take away" packs. In most cases the food is sometimes eaten directly from these polythene bags and then thrown away... Another means of refuse generation. The impression I get is that it seems it is also much cheaper and quicker to eat from these Polythene bags rather than from plates, which have to be washed after use (A means of saving time and money on the water bill). Our drinking water is also bagged in Polythene, so there will be no need for a glass or cup. This Polythene is disposed off after a meal and it becomes another source of refuse generation.

A visit to most offices in the mornings will present a spectacle for any foreign tourist visiting Ghana. You will see well dressed adult ladies and gentlemen sucking breast! Oh no, that’s not what I meant ... don’t get me wrong. The popular morning Hausa koko is sold in Polythene bags as well! Most workers buy breakfast on their way to work and punch a little hole in it and suck the koko out right from the bag! Again there is no need for a cup and a spoon, very ingenious way to eat a quick breakfast simple and hassle free.

Looking at these facts which I have mentioned earlier, it is no doubt that in Ghana today, the Polythene bag has become a very useful house hold commodity and thus millions are being produced to meet the ever increasing demands. However, the unfortunate thing is that these manufacturers have not put in place any mechanism to dispose off or re-cycle the waste. The Government agencies also responsible for the refuse collection and management cannot cope with the disposal either and as a result millions of tons of the waste produced in the city of Accra is by means of Polythene. These are the things which cause the filth and they litter our streets, roads and also block the drains which in turn cause flooding during the rains. Just take a trip to the places I mentioned earlier and see for your self. The flooding of areas in Accra like Gbawe last year was partly blamed on chocked drains – filth and Polythene.

Not until a way is found to curb this growing and uncontrollable menace, Accra will continue to remain as filthy as it is and believe you me, it will only get worse day by day. On the other hand AMA claims it is understaffed to deal with the problem, but I think the simple truth is that they are cash strapped. Too much emphasis on aspects like education (thanks to the former Veep’s war on Indiscipline), re-orientation and the lot are all secondary issues and furthermore, the good people of Ghana already know by now that cleanliness is next to Godliness. The only solution to the problem as it faces us now is MONEY! We also need new technologies to deal with the clear and present danger otherwise our cities will soon get overrun by filth.

My humble suggestion to the responsible authorities is that an immediate ban on the continued production of Polythene bags should be enforced until manufacturers find a way of disposing or re-cycling them. The Government and people of Ghana would also need to inject a lot of capital investment to keep the city clean. Government should do more to keep our cities clean by investing into modern waste disposal equipment rather than relying on a few private contractors who use obsolete equipment and manual means to dispose waste. This will not get the job done. The bottom line is that tackling the root cause of filth in our cities will be the only solution to keeping them clean. For me, the root cause is simply Poverty and Polythene bags.