KEPSA in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry led strategic partners and the waste management sector from the private sector, government and development partners, as the champions of circular economy and zero waste in celebrating the inaugural international day for Zero Waste on 30^th March 2023. 

The theme of the Kenya Zero Waste Day was “Attaining Zero Waste through Circular Economy and Extended Producer Responsibility in Kenya”. The Kenya Observation of the Inaugural Zero Waste Day focused on reflecting the journey of Kenya in transitioning to Zero Waste status with a particular focus on private sector investments, perspectives, approaches, policy and legal frameworks for attaining this status in Kenya.

The United Nations General Assembly’s (UNGA) seventy-seventh session on 14th December 2022 adopted the resolution of “Promoting zero-waste initiatives to advance the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” and proclaimed 30th March as the International Day for Zero Waste (hereafter Zero Waste Day) to be observed annually. The resolution was put forward by Türkiye with 105 other countries; Kenya being one of them and was adopted unanimously by the UNGA in 2022.

The resolution further invited all Member States, organizations of the United Nations system, other international and regional organizations, and relevant stakeholders, including civil societies, the private sector and academia, to observe Zero Waste Day with the aim of raising awareness of national, sub-national, regional, and local zero-waste initiatives and their contribution in achieving sustainable development.

Dr Ayub Macharia, Director of Education and Awareness in the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry presented the legal and policy frameworks of Kenya. Dr. Ayub in his presentation shared the national legal framework for waste management from linear to the circular economy in Kenya under Environmental Management and Coordination Act, Sustainable Waste Management Policy 2021 and Sustainable Waste Management Act 2022.

The immediate interventions for the attainment of zero waste status in Kenya, included the re-organization of existing dumpsites to reserve areas for re-organic waste material recovery and landfill, withdrawal of existing garbage transport licenses and exchanging them with licensing for organic and non-organic waste, providing waste sorting receptacles for segregation at source, and encouraging counties to create awareness on the circular model of waste management.

While segregation at source is popular, the clause enforcement is weak. He added that citizens, according to the law, were also obliged to separate hazardous waste from non-hazardous waste among many other activities, but noted that these measures were not sufficient in attaining the net zero waste level set, given that citizens have a right to a clean and sustainable environment. He urged that more efforts needed to be put in place to achieve the zero-waste target for a better and more sustainable environment.

In her presentation, KEPSA’s Ms. Faith Ngige highlighted the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) as a policy approach that aims to shift the responsibility for a post-consumer stage of the product lifecycle including tend-of-life disposal to the producer. Under EPR, producers are responsible for the environmental impact of their products throughout the entire product life cycle, including disposal. The approach incentivizes producers to design products that are easier to recycle or dispose of safely and encourages the adoption of sustainable production processes.  EPR promotes the circulative use of resources, builds a culture of responsibility across the value chain and drives responsible collection, and processing, recycling and disposal use of products at the end of their life cycle. Ms Ngige added that EPR programs create a financial incentive for producers to reduce waste by design and promote recycling by shifting the costs of disposal from the public system to the producers.

Dr Avinandan Taron, a researcher, Investment and Institutional Analyst for Resource Recovery and Reuse at IWMI, shared the contribution of bio-circular economy to zero waste. Zero bio-based economy focuses on unlocking new value systems for organic waste. The focus was on replacing non-renewable with biological resources, cascading the use of biomass and adopting approaches to minimize waste.  Business typologies for bio-economy included domestic and organic waste, fecal sludge and sewage sludge, and urban wastewater re-use. The four pillars of circular bio-economy are based on the provision of technical solutions that safeguard human and environmental health; business models and sustainable finance; enabling regulatory and financial environment and awareness capacities and behavior change facilitation. He encouraged organic waste revamping stating that it presents an array of opportunities, economic benefits, social and health gains, and healthy competition for resources.

The shared perspectives of Zero Waste from a private sector perspective, by the CEO BESIC Group, Mr John Kabuye, expounded upstream and downstream measures that are taken towards achieving the zero-waste end goal within business value chains. Under the upstream, he mentioned collaborative approaches in dealing with unnecessary materials that could be productive in another manufacturing sector, adding that Kenya needed to actively take this up to be able to fully maximize resources and ease the disposal burden on the consumer. He also commended Kenya for the advancement made in reuse and recycling which is currently at 15%.

CEO Junky Bins, Ms Lucy Ngorongo led in sharing insights on the contribution of waste service providers in zero waste in Kenya. While there exists sufficient institutional and coordination framework for waste service provision, there remains a huge opportunity to provide services that align with zero waste tenets. There was need to innovate and redesign the waste service provision such as collection and transportation in line with zero tenets and currently lots of investors have shown interest in investing in the sector.   Mr Tony Malila termed waste as an untapped resource and expounded on the opportunities in organic waste through the utilization of biogas for diverse uses such as heat for drying of food and cooking.

Ms Catherine Musolia, COO of Circular Innovation Hub, reiterated support offered by the hub to originate innovations and scale up for impact.  Zero Waste is beyond recycling and includes elements of innovative designs. Mr Teddy Obiero, the Chairman of Nyayo Embakasi Resident Association (NERA) and the larger Metropolitan Residents Association also added that the citizens have a big role to play in the realization of a Zero Waste Economy. The Session ended with a call to action to the participants to implement the knowledge shared during the celebration.