Sherab Lhamo

To help urbanites manage their own household wastes, Clean Bhutan in collaboration with National Housing Development Corporation Limited (NHDCL) and Thimphu Thromde launched Waste Academy in Changjiji on July 4.

By introducing a segregation system, the project aims to address the challenges faced in managing waste in absence of proper segregation at source. It is expected to effectively reduce the amount of waste dumped in the landfills.

The Chief Executive Officer of NHDCL Rinchen Wangdi said that the initiative could reduce thromde’s waste dumped in the landfills by creating marketable by-products. “If the production of by-products is not feasible, we can sell the waste to scrap dealers.”

In the future, there are also plans to advocate people on proper waste segregation.  

As the largest housing colony in Thimphu, Executive Director of Clean Bhutan, Nedup Tshering thinks that the first project implementation in the Changjiji Housing Colony would be impactful. “We will provide hands-on-training on how to segregate waste in nine different boxes and to make products out of it.”

Since 2021, Clean Bhutan has trained four batches of 200 women from the Changjiji Housing Colony. Clean Bhutan had sold over 50 bags and other products to Japan till date.

The colony has 750 households. 

In the next phase, the project will be implemented in 2,445 households living in NHDCL housing colonies in 17 dzongkhags. 

At a nominal fee, interested participants can join the training and later help educate their communities. “They can establish their own units too,” Nedup Tshering said. 

With a fund support of Nu 9.9 million from the Bhutan Trust Fund for Environmental Conservation, Clean Bhutan started the project in 2019.  A total of Nu 10.5 million was sourced through crowdfunding.