New Delhi: The Indian Pollution Control Association (IPCA) on Saurday presented awards to Delhi – NCR garbage collectors, institutions, and societies for their crucial contributions to waste management on the culmination of the project SORT (Segregation of Organic garbage for Recycling and Treatment), Phase IV at India International Centre, here.
“The award serves as a powerful incentive, highlighting the importance of their efforts and reinforcing their commitment to creating a cleaner and greener environment” IPCA said in a statement.
IPCA said the project SORT has been successfully implemented in more than 100 societies and institutions in Delhi NCR since 2018 and 50 societies covered in the year 2022-23.
It was spread in 34 locations of 6 zones of Delhi. The project has treated appx. 500 metric tons of organic/wet waste within the premises of societies and institutions and resulted in 70 metric tons of compost till the year 2022-23.
Speaking at the event, “It is very important to inculcate behavioral change among waste generators if we want to achieve the status of zero waste entity. Project S.O.R.T efficiently addresses this as one of its objectives is to enhance the rate of source segregation through community participation”.
Rubal Singh, Assistant Commissioner, Shahdara South Zone, hailed the S.O.R.T. team for their initiatives on wet waste management and said, ” the technology of composting being utilized in the S.O.R.T is very efficient and now, societies are willing to install these composters in their premises to process their wet waste.
“These composters are playing a crucial role in making the societies zero waste” he said.
Talking about the achievement of the project, Mr. Ashish Jain, Founder Director, IPCA said “After achieving great success in more than 100 societies/ institutions in Delhi NCR till date, the citizen of these cities has realized that decentralized waste management is the key to solve the problem of waste management in India”.
“Adopting the practices as communicated through SORT training helps in reducing the amount of waste reaching the landfills and enables its efficient recycling and treatment” said Jain.
Sharing some facts about the SORT initiative , Dr Radha Goyal, Deputy Director, IPCA said that India generates a staggering 1,60,000 tons of solid waste per day, yet the collection rate stands at a mere 50%.
She added that the concerted efforts undertaken by IPCA under S.O.R.T., which has been implemented successfully in 128 locations, effectively contributing to waste reduction and recycling”.
Dr. Radha reiterated the vision of IPCA which emphasizes on spreading the awareness about decentralized waste management to each and every stakeholder across India through efficient technologies like aerobic composting.
“This will not only solve the problem of waste management but also help in preserving the environment in many ways by reducing GHG emissions due to transportation and processing of waste at landfills” she added.
