Sri Lanka faced many catastrophes in managing wastes because of human errors and climate change impacts. Consequently, government administrators with stakeholder participation drafted a comprehensive policy on all aspects of waste management and now requires planning processes in the national, provincial, and local authority levels. Evidenced-Based Interactive Database is under construction. It will be a platform for all actors to participate in managing all types of wastes, inclusive of quantity and quality of wastes. This chapter describes municipal solid waste management, including present status of technology applications with the emphasis on 3R to divert wastes from landfills. It contains reports on e-wastes collection programs and some processing, polythene recycling, hazardous wastes management, including healthcare wastes, disaster and construction and demolition wastes, informal sector and recyclers, economics of waste management, and case studies. Future directives are given with coupling of intended nationally determined contributions for sustainable waste management.
TopIntroduction
The Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is an island in the Indian Ocean southwest of the Bay of Bengal, between 5° 55’ - 9° 50’ North latitude and 79° 42’ - 81° 53’ East longitude of the equator below the Indian subcontinent. It is separated from the Indian subcontinent by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait. It is located at a global logistics hub at an intersection with major air and sea routes between Europe and the Far East. Its span is 447 km from north to south and 219 km from east to west. The island has nine provinces and 25 administrative districts as shown in Figure 1 with a total area of land and water of 65,610 km2 and 62,705 km2 makes up land area and the rest 2,905 km2 consists of inland waters. Sri Lanka has a tropical climate and it consists of three major climatic zones namely wet zone, intermediate zone, and dry zone. The main industries consist of processing tea, rubber, coconuts, other agricultural commodities, fishing, telecommunications, insurance, banking, tourism, shipping, clothing, textiles, cement, petroleum refining, information technology services, and construction. The government system consists of a decentralized structure with 9 Provincial Councils (PCs) and 341 Local Authorities (LAs) made up of 24 Municipal Councils (MCs) which corresponds to a city, 41 Urban Councils (UCs) for semi-developed areas, and 276 Pradesheeya Sabhas (PSs) for rural areas. The categorization of LAs is according to its population and size. The LAs are responsible for providing a variety of local public services including sanitation and waste collection.
Figure 1. Provinces and districts of Sri Lanka (Nahallage, 2013)
The legal framework of solid waste management in Sri Lanka consists of five major components namely constitution, Acts and Legislations passed by the Parliament, such as National Environmental Act, Pradeshiya Sabha Act, Municipal Council Ordinance, etc. as well as Provincial Statutes, regulation and guidelines and by-laws of the LAs. In Sri Lanka, the basic legal framework required for solid waste management is provided under an umbrella of Government, Provincial Council and LA regulations and legislation. The 13th Amendment to the constitution (1987) and the Provincial Councils Act No. 42 of 1987, Sections 129, 130 and 131 of the Municipal Councils Ordinance (1980), Sections 118, 119 and 120 of the Urban Councils Ordinance, No. 61 of 1989, Sections 41 and 93 to 95 of the PS Act, No. 15 of 1987 and the National Environmental Act (NEA) are the key pieces of legislation governing solid waste management. According to the MC Ordinance, the Urban Councils (UC) Ordinance and the Pradeshiya Sabha (PS) Act, all Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) generated within the boundary of LAs is their property and they are mandated to remove and dispose of such waste materials without causing any nuisance to the public (Vidanaarachchi et al., 2006). At the national level, the responsibility for policies and implementation of plans concerning LAs lies with the Ministry of Internal & Home Affairs and Provincial Councils & Local Government. The formulation of national-level policies for solid waste management is conducted by the Ministry of Mahaweli Development & Environment (MoMD&E), while practical regulatory control and management are undertaken by the Central Environment Authority (CEA). The CEA was established under the National Environmental Act No. 47 of 1980 and is entrusted with the protection, management, and enhancement of the quality of the environment, for the prevention, abatement and control of pollution and with matters connected therewith. This principal Act was subsequently amended in 1988 and in 2000. In 2007, prevention of mosquitos breeding act (Act No. 11 of 2007) was enforced with the aim of ensuring that conditions are unfavorable to the breeding of mosquitoes. The pollution control regulations related to solid waste management that were enforced in the country from 1984 to 2017 are given in Table 1. The Ministry of Megapolis and Western Development (MoMWD) is a new ministry appointed by the Cabinet of Sri Lanka after August 2015 elections and it is responsible for planning for the megapolis development. The Ministry is in charge of planning solutions to resolve garbage management, housing of shanty dwellers and issues related to their needs, as well as drawing new traffic plans to avoid traffic jams in busy towns. And the Ministry of Health, Nutrition, and Indigenous Medicine (MoH) also provides and leads in administrative guidance from the perspective of health and sanitation.