Poor Waste Management Hampering Ghana’s Attainment of MDG On Sanitation - CONIWAS

By Francis Tandoh

With two years to the deadline of the target set by world leaders in the 2000 for the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), poor management of waste has been a cause of Ghana’s inability to attain the target on sanitation, according to Executive Secretary of the Coalition of Non-Governmental Organizations in Water and Sanitation (CONIWAS).

Addressing journalists in Accra recently to brief them on a recent water and sanitation conference (Mole 24 Conference) held in Kumasi the capital of the Ashanti Region, Benjamin Arthur said most big towns and cities do not have proper waste management systems thereby contributing to poor sanitation in the country.

According to the Multi Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) conducted by the country’s statistical service, 15 percent of Ghana’s 24.7 million people have access to improved latrine, 48 percent have shared latrine while 23 percent of the population practice open defecation.

He observed the country lacked proper mechanisms to manage the waste of those who have access to improved and shared latrines and noted that was quite frightening and disturbing.  

The statistics provided by the national statistical institution, according to him means that: “Technically, there is no system for managing our wastes in Ghana because one cannot tell exactly where the wastes of those with access to latrines end.”

Arthur called on the Ghanaian government to effectively partner academia, her development partners and the private sector to operationalize the environment and sanitation sector investment plant as well as scale-up successful pilots on sanitation.

He also called for transparency and accountability on the country’s local government ministry on waste and sanitation management as well as strict enforcement of legislations and bye-laws on sanitation.

  

Addressing the 68th United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York, recently, Ghana’s president, John Dramani Mahama conceded the country was not in a position to meeting the deadline on sanitation but observed that efforts were underway to improve the situation.

"We are on track to achieving MDGs 2, 3, and 6 as well. School enrolment, gender parity and reduction of HIV/AIDS have all seen dramatic progress and statistical shifts as a result of the work that has been done to reach our targets while we are lagging in MDGs 4, 5, and 7 — infant and maternal mortality as well as water and sanitation," he said.