Turning waste into wealth for 1000 households

The Project now covers 121,335 households and the level of segregation has reached 41.03%. Survey being conducted at the Thudiyalur Town Panchayat in Coimbatore district to assess the number of households and the quantum of waste being generated. Recruitment of supervisory staff and Green Friends is on; the project is scheduled to start shortly. Mobile environment awareness campaign in 15 schools in association with the Tamil Nadu Energy Development Agency (TEDA). One-day training programme for 70 Green Friends in Thoraipakkam panchayat. Green friends from the SWM project shave been formed into Self help Groups and are being trained on financial empowerment and federation management.

The Project now covers about 103,749 Households and it has reached a segregation level of 35.7% up from 33% till last quarter.

Apart from the existing local bodies, Hand in Hand has been considered for implementing SWM projects in 15,000 Households of Dindigul Municipality in Souht Tamil Nadu & 10,000 Households in Kannagi Nagar, Okkiyam Thoraipakkam near Chennai.

Additionally we were invited to conduct feasibility study in Fort St. George, that houses the State Legislative Assembly, secretariat and Offices of Indian Army, Cantonment of Pallavaram and at Chennai Port trust.

This has increased the level of delivery tremendously on Hand in hand and we would require continuous support to part fund the projects.

Personnel from Hand in Hand were a part of a larger team of govt officials, waste management experts etc that visited Sweden in the month of September to study the best practices in SWM in a visit funded by SWECO. The learnings from these visits have been disseminated internally as well as to key stakeholders like officials of local body administration (Dept. of Town & Country planning). This was a crucial learning opportunity to improve the projects being currently implemented as well as to plan better for future projects.

The main Challenge faced by the project is the non availability of primary/secondary collection vehicles delays expansion of SWM project at existing project centres.

The Waste management project now covers 82,282 households in 20 local balodes of 4 districts in Tamil Nadu, India.

The project has achieved a segregation rate of 33% from almost 0% at the beginning of the project. only 2/3 rds now goes to landfill in these 20 local bodies put together.

IN a recent development, the Director of Town Panchayat invited Hand in Hand to make a presentation to all the Assistant Directors of the Town Panchayat and a presentation was made on 16th June 2009 on the activities carried out by the Environment division in implementing Solid Waste Management projects in various Town Panchayats by strictly enforcing MSW rule 2000, the advantages of segregation of waste at source and the composting processes. This was widely appreciated and the Director gave instructions to the Assistant Directors to take the help of Hand in Hand in implementing SWM projects.