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Waste and the economy |
Throwing money away
The link between waste and the economy
 
Waste costs
- Waste is expensive
- Removing
litter and illegally dumped waste costs upward of
R135 million a year, four to seven times more than
the cost of legal disposal.
- The cost
of cleaning up Cape Town's central business district
alone is R90 million per year.
- Disposal
costs at landfill sites have increased by 700% over
the last decade. Costs are expected to increase even
more as landfill space is used up.
This is literally throwing money away - money that
could be saved by simple changes in our attitudes and
behaviour. The city desperately needs the funds to create
jobs, deal with our social problems and improve on services:
- Approximately
R115m / year could be saved if all illegally disposed
waste were mainstreamed into the legal collection
system.
- Even if
just 21% of dumped and littered waste could be mainstreamed,
we would save R24 million per year. WasteWise is aiming
for a 21% reduction of illegal waste in five years.
Littering and dumping doesn't decrease unemployment
A common misconception exists that littering creates
jobs for people as street cleaners. Although the City
does employ a modest number of people for this purpose,
resources for waste disposal are increasingly limited.
Money spent on clean-ups could be put to far better
use creating jobs in other areas. Also, investing resources
"higher up the waste stream", by creating
employment opportunities in reuse and recycling, is
more constructive and economical. In the United States,
for example, it is estimated that for every one job
waste disposal creates, recycling creates five to 10.
Waste stunts our growing industries
Cape Town's two most important income-generators, the
tourism and film industries, have both developed because
of Cape Town's extraordinary visual appeal. Both are
threatened by littering and dumping - or any other factors
that make Cape Town less attractive. The continued growth
of these industries is important for bringing in much
needed foreign revenue and creating jobs directly in
the fields of tourism and film, as well as in associated
or support services.
Waste = a lost resource
Most of what we call waste can be reused or recycled
in some way, and this is much cheaper in the long run:
it takes far less energy to reprocess used materials
than to process raw materials. Reducing, re-using and
recycling also cuts down on the amount of waste entering
landfills.
Further Reading
Rogerson, GM. 2001.
The Waste Sector and Informal Entrepreneurship in
Developing World Cities.
Urban Forum.
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