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The Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs, Ms Edna Molewa, has today cut the ribbon at Phokwane Local Municipality to mark the official launch of Hartswater landfill site. The project which was completed on 31 March 2012 was funded as part of the Working on Waste Programme and cost the Department of Environmental Affairs R15.2 million.

The landfill will provide services for solid waste disposal. The construction of the 2km site included leachate control, fencing of the landfill, construction of the leachate septic tank and pipe-work, Gate/Guard house, storage shed, access road and storm water management for surface water runoff.

The Municipality’s old site was found to be in contravention of the Waste Act which resulted in the Environmental Management Inspectorate, also known as the Green Scorpions, serving the Municipality with a notice of contravention of the Waste Act. Consequently, the project was listed as a priority in the Municipality's Integrated Development Plan of 2009/2010 financial year. Henceforth, the Municipality would operate a landfill site which is in full compliance with the Waste Act.

A contractor was appointed to build the entry level landfill site and worked within the specifications of ensuring the site has a compactor, a 6x3m light load vehicle weigh bridge, two security booms and a waste water pump. Added to these would be the drilling of three boreholes equipped to monitor groundwater conditions

The implementation of the project was labour-intensive and is the first of its kind since it was built with hands and 288 people were employed during the construction phase. The Department of Environmental Affairs will replicate the hands-built process in its future projects wherever possible. The project has provided a total of 29 512 person working days during its implementation and more than 90% of workers were sourced locally.

Speaking at the launch event, Minister Molewa said, “The Department of Environmental Affairs through the Environmental Protection and Infrastructure Programme is funding the implementation of various environmental projects in the Northern Cape using labour intensive methods in line with the requirements of Expanded Public Works Programme, EPWP.”

Minister emphasised that among some of the key requirements of the EPWP, is that while addressing the mandate of the Department, we need to create jobs, develop small businesses and also ensure that skills development opportunities are created.

The landfill is expected to be in operation for twenty (20) years. As a result, permanent employment opportunities exist for a waste instructor, gate house operator and a waste compactor operator when the landfill is in full operation. The responsibility for absorbing those workers remains with the municipality as they will be the owning agency for the project. The municipality must also provide a responsible person to sample the boreholes, do tests on the samples for purposes of groundwater monitoring.

The community of Hartswater will benefit from the development as it will be established far from where they reside and therefore problems such as odours and health risk will be eliminated, and a generally clean environment and a controlled waste disposal method will be achieved.

It is the obligation of the Municipality to keep the operation of the landfill on-going in conformance with the Waste Management Act and the municipality's waste management plan.

Minister Molewa went on to say that, “In line with the Green Economy Plan, measures will be implemented to strengthen and expand our economic growth through recycling and enterprise development so that we can generate and sustain jobs as well as formalise existing jobs in the waste area as part of the economy. Our targets for 2015 are to create 69 000 new jobs in the waste sector and 2 600 additional SMMEs and cooperatives participating in waste service delivery and recycling.”