Background

Pokhara Sub-Metropolitan city is situated in central Nepal west of Kathmandu. It is the third largest city after Kathmandu and Biratnagar and one of the most popular tourist destinations of Nepal. Pokhara is filled with flowing rivers and lakes with the backdrop of Himalayan ranges.

In recent years, solid waste management (SWM) of Pokhara city has become a major environmental and public health issue as any other urbanizing cities. In Nepal, as per the local self governance act, SWM is the responsibility of the local government. But the provision of SWM by the municipality has been less than satisfactory so far due to fund constraints. Municipality is constantly struggling to make the city pollution free.

PPP Modality

Plastic chips as raw material for plastic industry

Pokhara Municipality has entered into a public private partnership agreement with Yam Composting for solid waste management of Wards 6 & 9. Yam Composting collects waste from 30 hotels and 25 households, and plastic from 200 households from Lake Side, a major tourist hub in Pokhara. Organic and inorganic wastes are then segregated in its recycling yard. Yam Composting deals with organic, inorganic and recyclable waste products differently. Organic waste is taken for animal feeding and composting in its private composting plant. The soft plastics such as polythene is recycled into plastic blocks and and hard plastics such as bottles, buckets are grinded into small plastic chips and sold to plastic industries in Nepal and India. Other inorganic materials such as metal, glass, paper are sold to scavengers.

Achievements

The implementations of the project have significantly contributed to solving the major environmental and social problems related to accumulated waste in the streets as well as the dump sites which contributed to a very serious health hazard for the population. Thus, the project has contributed to improvement in urban environment and hygiene.

The project is generating revenue from waste recovery and recycling technologies subsequently reducing the burden to municipality.

Yam Bahadur Pariyar, founder of Yam Composting was a sweeper in the municipality and started his own recycling yard in Prithvi Chowk, Pokhara when he left municipality job. He has been appreciated by many for his unique business sense. He says, “I was considered a fool but now people are viewing my work positively”. He says appreciation for his work motivates him to continue and he has dreams of making Pokhara a plastic free city.

There are other benefits such as employment opportunity especially for women, presently employs 25 out of which 14 are women. It has improved drastically the present waste management of the area and can be replicated in other areas of the city.

PPPUE Contribution

PPPUE has been providing technical and financial support to municipalities such as Pokhara in privatizing solid waste management functions at different stages like collection, transfer, reuse, recycle, final disposal etc. PPPUE supported Yam Composting to provide protective gear such as gloves, boots, masks, apron etc. for a safer work environmentin the recycling yard. Yam Composting staff was also given orientation on hygienic working conditions in the recycling yard. They were informed on the safe and healthy working environment as per labor laws and encouraged to apply them for betterment of their workers. PPPUE is in continuous communication with Yam Composting to improve the work environment of the recycling yard. PPPUE is also supporting Yam Composting to expand and replicate the system in other parts of the city.