The private agency finds it has to raise awareness as much as it needs to collect waste

Disposal: Although more than a thousand residents have registered with Greener Way, only seven have availed the special service, where garbage is collected after 5pm.

More than two months after Greener Way took over the collection and disposal of waste in the central and southern zones in the city, the company initiated the special evening service to curb the problem of residents disposing of their waste in open public places.

The special waste collection service is only for those households that have no one at home to dispose of garbage between 9am to 5pm.  On March 16, the Greener Way started the special service with two households, one each in Motithang and Changzamtog.

Operational head with Greener Way, Dorji Wangchuk, said that the main reason for rendering the special service to only office goers at an extra cost was to stop them from disposing waste elsewhere. “Almost 90 percent of waste disposed at inappropriate places are by office goers,” he said.

From 8am until 1pm, all 11 compactors are on the move, collecting garbage from about 20,000 homes, including hotels in the two zones.  Starting Monday, the trucks will start collecting garbage from 7am.

“It’s difficult to send collection trucks to every household before 8:30am with only 11 compactors,” Dorji Wangchuk said.

Office goers, who wish to avail the special service can dial 1213, or email them at gwfeedback2015@gmail.com with their name, contact number, location and a brief description about the waste problem they face.

Greener Way is also coming up with another initiative called ‘service on demand’ for residents living outside the thromde zone.  This service is also available to hotels that generate large quantities of organic waste and requires garbage collection service more than three times a week.

Greener Way also charges hotels a monthly service fee to compensate for transportation and manpower costs, and also offers services to collect electronic wastes on call.

Debsi and Kabisa are two areas in the city where residents do not receive any waste collection service currently.  Greener Way staff said this has resulted in residents leaving their garbage along the road when they drive to work.

“The issue will be discussed with the thromde and dzongkhag to come up with a solution soon, because the residents outside the city do not have a place to dispose their waste, so they don’t have a choice,” said Dorji Wangchuk.

But should residents miss the garbage collection time, residents also have the option to dispose their segregated garbage at the Greener Way’s operation centre below Kelki higher secondary school any time between 9am to 5pm from Monday to Saturday.

Meanwhile, residents have welcomed the Greener Way’s garbage collection efforts, even though they are taking a while to adopt the segregation aspect.

A Changjiji resident, Dechen Wangmo, said the waste collection service by Greener Way is better than the thromde’s, even though it doesn’t have a fixed collection time.  Her mother, she said, is the one who always goes to dispose garbage when the collection truck arrives.

“If any of the family members mistakenly put dry waste in the wet waste bin, my mother scolds us, saying it’s embarrassing to have the waste collectors refuse the garbage because it’s not segregated,” she said. “Now my four year-old daughter knows what goes in which bin.”

Changjiji, Chubachu and the core town area, still have problems in segregating waste.

By Dechen Tshomo

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