Summary 

The project intends to ensure integrated solid waste management towards zero waste and a circular economy vision for Eswatini. The main focus of the waste streams in this project include healthcare waste, E-waste and plastic waste. The project will help reduce the pollution of chemicals and waste, improve the health and livelihoods of the general population and workers through a gender-responsive approach, and foster green growth through public and private partnerships in the services of waste management and circular businesses, particularly small businesses. The Global Environment Facility funds the project and the Ministry of Tourism and Environmental Affairs implements it.

Background

The environmental contamination associated with poor management of waste – either municipal, industrial, or sanitary – is a global issue and one of the challenges facing Eswatini. The mismanagement of waste negatively affects the economy, as it prevents the re-use or re-cycle of valuable materials which instead end up in the environment, affecting not only its quality but also hindering key economic activities like tourism, fishery and agriculture. At the same time, mismanagement of waste is more frequent in areas where the absence of infrastructures – transportation, water and electricity networks – prevents the efficient collection, transportation, treatment and recycling of waste. Therefore, a perverse loop does exist between poverty and waste mismanagement which are mutually reinforced.

Project Outcomes 

The project aims to:

• Improve waste management regulation in Eswatini.

• Update the National Implementation Plan, including the revised inventory of the 12 initial Persistent Organic Pollutants, plus the inventory of the additional POPs covered by the amendment of the Stockholm Convention.

• Promote a circular economy of plastic products, electric and electronic equipment organic waste, and women entrepreneurship.

• Move toward a zero-waste approach, through a better segregation of non-infectious, recyclable waste from the infectious/hazardous healthcare waste.

• Replace mercury devices with the most suitable options for the given purposes. Mercury contact thermometers will be replaced by alcohol thermometers or electronic thermometers.

• Establish a knowledge hub to exchange experience in healthcare waste management, with specific reference to projects supported under the GEF Chemical and Waste focal area.

For more information about this project, contact UNDP Sustainability Specialist, Mangaliso Mohammed, at mangaliso.mohammed@undp.org