EPA to partner Zoomlion, others to clean Ghana

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has expressed its willingness to work in partnership with Zoomlion Ghana Limited  (ZGL), a subsidiary of Jospong Group of Companies (JGC), and other waste management companies to keep the country clean.  

The Executive Director of EPA, Dr Henry Kwabena Kokofu says EPA will open its doors to collaborate with private players in the waste management industry to ensure their works are backed by compliance.

Dr Kokofu expressed satisfaction at the work of Zoomlion Ghana Limited and added that they will undertake more projects with the company.

He also commended all private waste companies for their efforts to rid the city of filth.

Dr Kokofu added that EPA will not hesitate to apply sanctions to individuals and institutions who fail to adhere to sanitation rules. According to him, metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies (MMDAs) have the responsibility to effectively manage waste within their jurisdictions.

He, therefore, urged the MMDAs to step up their game in the management and disposal of waste while urging Ghanaians to brace themselves to the reality of paying a bit more to ensure proper waste management in their communities.

“We must have a concerted effort in dealing with the waste we generate. The consciousness of the nation must be awakened, and all the religious and traditional leaders must join in the awakening of this consciousness among Ghanaians,” Dr Kokofu said. 

The EPA boss made the remarks on the back of a presentation by JGC at the ongoing COP 26 meeting at the UN Climate Change Conference, on what the company was doing to help the country address the negative impact of climate change.

He said the EPA will also be monitoring every stage of the country’s waste disposal chain. This, he said will ensure the government gets value for money in the management and disposal of waste. He also explained that the EPA’s decision was to enable them to track where and how especially electric wastes were being disposed of.

The collaboration with the private sector, he said, would be directed towards seeing the “point source of waste collection, particularly electrical and electronic waste, where they are being collected? The quantum collected? And where they are being transported to? The off-taker facility will help in using them as raw materials to the recycling plant.”

This when done, he said, will “help us as a nation to have data on how much we are collecting.”

Meanwhile, Zoomlion has welcomed the decision of EPA to monitor every stage of Ghana’s waste disposal value chain. According to ZGL, the collaboration will urge to continue delivering quality services.

At the ongoing world climate change summit, the Consultant, Engineering, Design and Projects Department, AFESC, Mr Israel Boakye Acheampong, in a presentation, explained that JGC was using the opportunity presented at the COP26 to show its contributions to the climate change space, with innovative ideas to sustainably manage waste in Ghana with a positive impact on climate.

He stressed the need for strategic partnerships to augment JGC’s skills. His presentation focused on JGC’s integrated waste management approach that combines innovation, technology and management based on reuse, recycling, recovery and safe disposal of waste since 2006.

He said JGC was ready to make effective use of various technical and financial opportunities at the COP26 to accelerate its support for Ghana in mitigating the impact of climate change.

To address indiscriminate dumping and burning of waste in Ghana, Mr Boakye Acheampong noted that Zoomlion has hugely invested in storage facilities with dustbins and collection systems in the country, which has improved waste collection from homes, from about four per cent in 2006 to about 21 per cent in 2021.t

The Managing Director of Africa Environmental Sanitation Consult, the research wing of the Jospong Group of Companies (JGC), Dr Abena Antwi Asomaning, who is also at the climate change summit, minced no words in asserting that activities of Ghanaians have contributed to the climate change condition.

“If not anything how people throw about things in the environment, even work to do, relationship and even how people dump things in the sea,” she said.

She called for the government’s intervention in the recycling of waste.

Freeman Kroyekpor