Accra gets first $7m waste transfer station, medical treatment facility

Vice President Kwesi Amissah-Arthur has inaugurated a waste transfer project with the capacity to hold about 50% of all wastes generated in Accra daily.

The project also has a medical treatment facility to manage all the medical wastes through the application of modern technologies.

The Zoompak Waste Transfer Station and Medical Treatment Facility, according to Board Chair of Zoompak Ghana Ltd, Daniel Amartey Mensah, costs a total of $7 million.

An inauguration brochure of the project located at Teshie revealed that the waste transfer station on a daily basis can process 1,300 tons of wastes – which is half wastes produced in Accra. There are also plans to build similar facilities in other parts of the country.

Giving a keynote address at the commissioning of the project, the Vice President said the best solution to Ghana’s waste problem would be when citizens make it a part of their civic responsibility to keep their communities clean.

He also called on organisers of the monthly National Sanitation Day cleanup campaign to extend the exercise to rural areas.

He said the cleanup campaign should be a re-awakening of the communal spirit that characterize the rural areas.

The Vice President therefore called on chiefs and opinion leaders to lead efforts at keeping the country clean.

Mr Nii Lante Vanderpuje, Deputy Minister of Local Government and Rural Development said the location of the transfer station in Teshie is strategic since it will cut down cost of transporting waste from different parts of the capital to landfill sites.

He said transferring waste to the facility first to be processed would reduce the daily pressure on the various landfill sites, adding that it has been the long awaited appealing alternative.

Dr Joseph Siaw Agyepong, Chairman and Chief Executive of Zoomlion and Jospong Group of Companies commended President John Mahama and the Vice President for supporting the project from its onset.

He called on the local assemblies to enforce sanitation by-laws and ensure that all residential areas in the city have refuse bins to facilitate a coordinated approach to waste collection.

He revealed that a similar project will be replicated at Achimota to further facilitate waste management in the city.

The Turkish government provided technological and logistical support for the construction of the Zoompak project.

Accra tops the country’s regions in terms of sanitation-related problems.

The capital city is characterised by choked drains, indiscriminate waste disposal and uncollected refuse in central waste containers, among others.