Private collection

Do we really need the French to collect our garbage? Dalia Dabbous sheds light on a recently signed contract that puts Alexandria waste management in foreign hands
Driving along Alexandria's corniche, the air is fresh and redolent with the smells of the sea, tinged with a hint of fresh paint. The sidewalks are spic and span and the buildings bright and clean. Turn down any road towards the heart of the city, however, and these glimmering vistas give way to a nightmare of ever-present putrefying refuse.
Tracking down figures relating to Alexandria's extensive waste collection problem are difficult, but the environmental NGO Friends of the Earth can offer some estimates. Mohamed El-Guindy, who heads the organisation in Alexandria, says that only 60 per cent of the 2,600 tons of waste produced daily by Alexandria's 3.5 million inhabitants ends up collected. Garbage collectors are simply overwhelmed by the task, particularly in the summer, when the population increases by an additional million vacationers seeking cool sea breezes.
Admitting to the problem is the first step to solving it, and Alexandria Governor Mohamed Abdel-Salam El-Mahgoub finally took that step last year when he issued a contrite public apology for the state of the city's streets. What came next, however, is more controversial. Promising that public services would soar to the top of his agenda, El-Mahgoub summarily announced that he was privatising waste management in Alexandria.
The decision led to an as-yet-unrealised agreement with the French waste management company CGEA Onyx -- a point of contention for people employed by the already existing waste management structure of Alexandria, who argue that their systems merely needed to be improved, not thrown out altogether. The unprecedented contract was first signed last September, with a second signing following on 23 March. The agreement covers not only the cleaning of beaches and urban areas, but the collection of household, commercial, and medical waste. It also stipulates the construction of a new landfill and medical waste incinerator.
This is the first contract of its kind in Egypt and the region, but despite the enthusiastic signings, no tangible effects have materialised. Implementation has yet to begin and the information on what this will ultimately entail for both workers in the field and the city's residents remains vague.
Negotiations to privatise Alexandria's trash collection actually started several years back. According to information obtained by Al-Ahram Weekly from those party to cutting the deal, Onyx did not rank first among bidders for the technical aspects of its programme, but it did offer the best price. Even so, the sum is still hefty. The governorate will pay Onyx $446 million for the treatment of one million tons of waste per year over the next 15 years. This means that for every ton of waste, the govenorate is paying LE100 -- almost 10 times as much as it was paying before calling in foreign expertise. Waste management currently costs the governorate between LE15 and LE20 per ton of garbage, so the deal is actually a financial liability.
Residents are worried that the burden of this cost will fall on them and that the money is not being funnelled back into the city. One environmentalist, who preferred to remain anonymous, pointed out that the government could have increased the salaries of garbage men instead of paying so much money to an international firm.
Magda, a housewife in the affluent area of Kafr Abdou, is equally irritated. "Have all our economic problems been solved so that we can afford to pay all this money to a foreign company to handle our garbage collection?" she asks.
According to Tarek Genena, project consultant and chief executive officer of the environmental consulting company EcoConServ, a cost-efficient approach would have been for local firms to get experienced personnel and "support" from an international company, rather than getting an international company to do all the work. "Privatisation of solid waste management has been decided on too quickly," suggests Genena, who feels that before a decision like this was taken, the governorate should have investigated its options further. "A proper solid waste profile does not exist for any governorate in Egypt. Any statistics, like the rate at which garbage is generated or the amounts that are recycled or composted, are based on scattered studies."
Despite the poor documentation, Genena contends that Alexandria was ahead of the game. "Alexandria has been the most prepared. To an extent, they did their homework," he says, adding that many governorates still face serious problems like the inability to evaluate, inspect, and monitor operations and the uncertainty of available financial resources. Most have no clear mechanism for dealing with existing waste management companies and NGOs.
While many residents are outraged that the government is pouring so much money into a risky endeavour, they are mostly concerned about how the cost will be distributed across the population. Friends of the Earth's El-Guindy says several options are still under consideration, but that the most probable scenario would be an addition of a fee to people's electric bill. The fee would be assessed depending on the economic level of the area. Residents of the posh district of Rushdi, for example, would be required to pay LE6 or LE7, while less affluent areas would be required to pay less.
This scenario could end up punishing the many people who make their living off the wealth of these residents -- the people who live on the fringes or rooftops of upscale apartment buildings, but for whom LE6 can make a big difference. To close such loopholes, another option would be to charge a percentage of the household's electric bill.
Walking through the working-class district of Dahriya Al-Ahram, one can find people who are eluding even the small fees expected of them under the current system. Ali Abdel-Raouf, a shop owner, was watching the garbage collectors closely until they were out of sight. He then quickly dumped his garbage bin overflowing in rubbish onto the street. Abdel-Raouf complains that he cannot spare the few pounds asked for by the local garbage collection service -- he can barely pay his family's rent, he says.
Genena maintains that once people are paying for their garbage collection, they will be entitled to demand that it is done properly. Who will they complain to? A team of some 150 university graduates will be trained to oversee the implementation of the project. This support team will field any complaints and report them to the governorate.
This brings into question what and how much action the governorate can take if the terms of the agreement are not met -- an inquiry that was only met with more vagueness. There is talk, however, that if there is any abrogation of the terms of the contract, penalties will be implemented.
As far as some critics are concerned, this does not cut the mustard. "If one company handles the waste management of the city, and for any reason fails to implement any part of the agreement for even one day, the city will drown in garbage," argues Tarek Nabil, a manager at the private cleaning company Europa 2000, which currently manages the area surrounding San Stefano. "There should be several companies in charge of waste management. This will foster competition, so when one company fails to do its work properly, another one will step in."
But even if collection is efficient, EcoConServ's Genena indicated that there will be no real difference in recycling, and composting processes. "What is expected [of Onyx] is more efficient collection, transportation, and land filling -- aspects of proper waste disposal. Anything else is just a question of what is more profitable for the company," he pointed out. Nothing in the contract says that Onyx must recycle a certain percentage of waste and Genena alludes to the fact that it might be more economically viable for the company to compress the garbage and transfer it to the landfill 60 kilometres west of Alexandria. "Recycling may not take place at all if it is not economically feasible," he warned.
Proponents of the project, such as El-Guindy, insist that the Onyx agreement will be a pilot for other governorates. He maintains that Onyx's expertise, facilities, and past accomplishments in 25 countries are unmatched in the region. The governorate's decision to contract Onyx, says El-Guindy, is "a significant civilised step" in combating Alexandria's waste problem.
But what of the army of men who currently battle with Alexandria's garbage every day? Today the garbage collection system is manned as follows: household waste is collected by informal communities of garbage collectors who receive monthly fees from each household ranging between LE1.50 and LE5, depending on the area. Street waste is either collected by garbage men employed by the governorate -- who receive a monthly wage of LE120 -- and private companies, such as Europa 2000, which operate three daily shifts and pay their garbage men up to LE300. Such companies, however, usually operate in high-income areas, where residents can afford the services.
Genena explained that Onyx is committed to hiring and training somewhere between 50 and 70 per cent of the garbage collectors employed by the governorate. Their salaries, however, will probably be unaffected. Mohamed Hassan and Ahmed Fathi, two household garbage men in Dahriya, say that they were told they would receive training, but so far the whole project has been delayed. Both young men, barefoot and wearing pants darned with patches, their shirts stained with dirt, hope they will get a chance to work in the new company and improve their lifestyles. "The company told us that the leader of the garbage collectors in each area would be trained and would be responsible to train the others," says a hopeful Hassan.
Europa 2000's Nabil told the Weekly that his employees were also approached. He told them that they either had the option of working with Onyx or moving to one of the company's other locations. From the looks of it, however, the whole labour issue is still in the air and even if Onyx does re-employ garbage workers their lot will not improve much.
In the shabby, run-down sorting and composting plant in Muharram Bek, the manager has no exact date for when Onyx will start its renovation and operation of the 16-year-old plant. Like everyone else, the manager is still waiting. Mahmoud El-Ra'i, dean of the Institute of Higher Studies and Research in Alexandria, was asked to conduct preliminary studies on the landfil that is to be constructed in accordance with the contract. But he still has no clear idea whether the landfil is ready for operation. "There will be action in June," he told the Weekly cryptically. El-Guindy's estimate was more ambitious. He told the Weekly that the latest launch date was 15 June.
In the meantime Alexandrians are tired of their polluted streets. As they drown in a sea of garbage, they are still waiting for answers.
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