International training for local Environmental Manager
Ndumiso Nongwe, Makana’s Environmental Manager, will be participating in an international
training programme on local government environmental management in urban areas in Stockholm, from
May 24 to June 10.
International training for local Environmental Manager
Ndumiso Nongwe, Makana’s Environmental Manager, will be participating in an international
training programme on local government environmental management in urban areas in Stockholm, from
May 24 to June 10.
The programme is sponsored by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) with the long-term goal of contributing to institutional strengthening and capacity development in the participants’ countries.
Applicants had to submit proposals on their projects for change to improve local government environmental management in their home country.
Training will focus on these projects to assist implementation in the respective municipalities. Twenty-fi ve candidates from municipalities of varying size were selected from eight countries in Africa.
Makana’s project for change looked at alternative basic environmental services and technologies suitable for other localities of the municipality and the establishment of localised community environmental centres in Makana.
A followup programme with the same group will run in November in a region still to be determined and announced by Sida.
Ward waste management initiative
Makana Municipality, in collaboration with the Rhodes University Environmental Education and Sustainability Unit, is implementing a pilot waste management education and awareness project in a number of local wards
that have been identifi ed as having particularly serious waste management issues.
The main aim of the initiative is to educate, encourage and empower citizens in these wards to take responsibility and control over the management of waste in their areas so as to improve the living environment and reduce risk to human and environmental health.
This will be done by helping people to manage the waste in their own houses, yards, schools, and businesses, including cafés, taverns and the street traders.
Community environmental facilitators have been appointed to work with the relevant ward councillors, ward committees, schools, churches, clinics and other key institutions to fi rstly clean up some of the main problem areas, and then to keep these areas clean through more careful waste management.
Their role is to provide basic education and support to their fellow citizens in their wards to implement action plans they are developing with the ward committees. This pilot project is due to run from mid-May to the end of June 2010.
The idea is to secure more funding in the future to roll this out to all wards in the municipality later this year or by early 2011.
Grahamstown landfi ll site concerns
Concerns have been raised about the state of the Grahamstown landfi ll site by Cindy Deutschmann, a member of the Grahamstown Riding Club.
In particular, she is concerned that incoming waste is not being covered. She also reports that the practice of dumping of amputated ostrich feet continues, and she has seen carcasses of donkeys, dogs and cats being dumped, unburied, at the tip.
In addition, there are a number of people living on the site on a semi-permanent basis, posing a health risk to themselves, and a security risk to businesses around the tip.
The activities of scrap metal scavengers who have been chased away from the landfi ll site also create a fi re risk in the area.
Deutschmann has addressed these concerns to the municipality with a challenge to get their house in order on the site or the complaints will be taken to a higher authority.
A great freebie
The Department of Environment Affairs (DEA) has recently published a very attractive Marine Recreational Activity Information Brochure with up-to-date information on the regulations that apply to recreational fi shing in South Africa’s marine and estuarine environments, and scuba-diving and jet-ski use in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).
The good news is that this brochure is available free of charge at the Grahamstown Post Offi ce or from DEA: Private Bag X2, Roggebaai, 8012 or phone 021 402 3911.
Contacts for Makana
Enviro-News: Nikki Köhly: nkohly@yahoo. com, 046 636 1643 / Lawrence Sisitka: heilaw@imaginet.co.za, 046 622 8595 / Jenny Gon: j-gon@intekom. co.za, 046 622 5822 / Dan Wylie d.wylie@ru.ac.za, 046 603 8409 / Nick James: nickjames@intekom.co.za, 046 622 5757 / Strato Copteros strato@iafrica.com,082 785 6403
