Thusano Lefatsheng (Our World Working Together)
Posted by Emilie on June 25th, 2008
husano Lefatsheng (Our World Working Together)
Work has officially started a few weeks ago. I am working for an NGO (non-governmental organization) called Thusano Lefatsheng (TL), which means something like ?communities helping each other?. It works to reduce poverty in remote areas of Botswana through the sustainable use of natural resources. They work with communities to teach them how to grow certain plants that they can harvest and sell themselves. The project that I?m working on deals with littering of major roads coming out of Gaborone, the capital of Botswana. Although government workers pick up the litter on a regular occasion, there is considerable litter buildup on the side of the roads. If the current growth rate of the city doesn?t decrease, it wouldn?t be unrealistic to predict that the litter buildup will increase rapidly, according to the growth rate of the city. I am involved in evaluating the degree of litter on three roads for each of Gaborone, Thamaga, and Mmankgodi (the latter two being small communities to the south of Gabs). Once we collected our nine samples, I sorted through the litter to separate it into categories of recyclables (paper, plastics, glass, aluminum, tin,
cardboard) and garbage. This will give us a good idea of what main industries we will need to communicate with to see if they are interested in starting a type of recycling program. Then, we?ll go into the communities I mentioned to speak to the Chiefs and residents to learn about their opinions concerning the litter. We want to know whether they believe that it is a problem, and if so, how it has been affecting their lives or livelihoods. We also want to learn whether they would want to develop, implement and maintain an anti-litter program, where they could be responsible for the drop-off location of recyclables, for the pickup of recyclables, or for the recycling of the material. The end purpose of the project is to develop a community-based anti-litter program, funded perhaps by the government, in order to protect the environment of peri-urban communities while creating employment opportunities in those communities. So, my project focuses more on the indirect conservation of resources, which are contaminated by litter.
I very much look forward to meeting various stakeholders in the community that can guide me in determining why the presence of litter is so widespread, and whether a successful recycling program could be established. I am also looking forward to doing a literature review to widen my knowledge on current African waste management programs. I hope that enough literature exists in order to determine the challenges that other African communities have faced with regards to litter, how they overcame the challenges, and assess whether their solutions could apply to the southern communities of Botswana.
