EMERGING SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT ISSUES IN BEITBRIDGE BORDER TOWN: EVIDENCE FROM A PARTICIPATORY APPROACH

Driven by the fears of repeated 2008/2009 cholera incidence that affected Beitbridge Town Council (BTC) amongst other urban centres, this study uses a participatory methodology to gather and synthesise the views of key stakeholders involved in solid waste management (SWM). Within this approach, field observations, scenario analysis and document review were triangulated with stakeholder insights to recommend practical and urgent solution to avert a potential public health disaster. Focus on BTC also stems from its unique experience that can be explained by demographic and socio-economic characteristics of a sizeable transit population, albeit insignificantly contributing to the town?s revenue. This situation complicates service provision such as SWM. However, questions have been raised to understand why the town exhibits a sharp contrast from its counterpart, Musina in South Africa, which generally meets the expected sanitation standards. Could it be that the town authorities have totally forgotten about the 2008/2009 cholera disaster? Or, the unravelling situation is beyond the capacity of the town to cope? The study isolated demographic pressure, from a mix of transit migrants and natural population growth, triggered by economic challenges that tend to attract people to the border with South Africa, coupled with weakening capacity of the town council to manage solid waste and other social services. Other drivers of poor SWM are seen in mushrooming of unserviced residential stands, unregulated business activities and absence of functional by-laws. We aver that in order to avert a looming health disaster, there is urgent need to capacitate the town council through a holistic and multi-stakeholder approach that should embrace the concept of integrated solid waste management.