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The Kathmandu Valley, comprising three cities, has been widely acclaimed for its natural beauty, rich culture and excellence of art and architecture since ancient times. However, due to sharp growth in the population, houses, shops, restaurants, hotels, carpet industries, garment industries and haphazard urbanisation, heaps of garbage are strewn here and there, causing waste management problems.
Industries are increasing in the valley day by day, which produce more waste than all the city households combined.
But about 90 percent of the industries that produce toxic waste are operating without a waste management system in place since many years ago.
This fact is in accordance with the Environment Statistics of Nepal-2019 (ESN), which came to this conclusion after conducting a survey of 4,076 industries across the country a few years ago.
According to the existing laws, an industry must have an in-built system for the management of all kinds of waste it produces.
However, only about a fifth of the industries categorised as 'chemical and chemical products' in this country have installed an in-built waste management system.
In fact, industries pollute the water bodies, air and land as well as noise pollution,so they must install an in-built mechanism to minimise environmental degradation in the areas where they are based. In this regard, the concerned authorities should also constantly monitor to see that they are in accordance with the laws; however, this has not been done here still now.
Although industries are the backbone of economic prosperity, they must not be allowed to play foul with the environment and local communities.
But this fact has not been realised by the concerned authorities as yet.
Since the Local Government Operation Act has given legal teeth to the local levels to handle this issue, they must act to make sure that all the industries strictly follow the laws.
Solid waste management is affected by activities carried out in other sectors, such as transport and public works, health, drinking water, local development, industry, commerce, tourism and environment protection.
Such management is not possible with the sole effort of an individual or organisation.
Therefore, an integrated policy for solid waste management and environment protection should be formulated, encompassing and regulating multi-sectorial activities.
In addition, ways and means should be devised to enlist people's participation in waste management. Only that can facilitate efficient and effective implementation of waste management.
A version of this article appears in the print on December 3, 2021 of The Himalayan Times.
