OVERVIEW OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE IN TEMA
The waste management department of the TMA is responsible for waste management in the metropolis. The main MSW management strategy has been collection, transportation and disposal on dumpsites. 10,700 tonnes of municipal solid waste is collected and disposed off every month in the metropolis. Collection of MSW- largely undertaken by private contractors- has been house-to-house where compactor collection vehicles move from one house to the other collecting stored solid waste at least once a week at a monthly cost to service beneficiaries. The other mode of collection has been central communal container collection where skip trucks go in to hoist skip containers that has been placed at sanitary sites within the communities. Such containers are filled with waste by householders who cannot afford the house-to-house services. The frequency of collection here depends on the rate at which the containers become full. In some cases collection can be eight times in a day. Collected MSW is transported over an average distance of 15 km to the only dumpsite at Kpone (a nearby
community). The dumpsite, an old borrow pit of area 6 km2 from which gravel had been removed over the years is being
reclaimed with refuse. The site has been operating for 15 years and is scheduled to close in the year 2015 (Africa
Development Bank, 2002).
Any salvageable items are removed from the waste by 50 to 70 scavengers operating at the site. Disposed refuse is compacted but no soil cover is applied. A strong odour of decomposing organic waste, flies and windblown litters are permanent features at the dumpsite and its surroundings.
Industrial establishments are responsible to dispose waste in their own terms. No waste transfer station exists in Tema. Waste recovery and recycling of metals, glass and certain types of plastics are carried out on a small scale by scavengers. Since
2005, plastic recycling companies have been set up by private investors to recycle the highly increasing amount of high density plastics in the waste stream to low density equivalents which are used as carrier bags. The absence of source separation of solid waste a part of the MSWM system has been a major challenge to recycling companies. Raw materials for recycling plants are recovered by scavengers after dumping, increasing the cost of recycling operation with an associated decrease in value of recycled products.