MUZAFFARABAD: The Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) government has launched the ‘Suthra Kashmir’ programme under which solid waste management services will be outsourced at the district level, with advertisements inviting private parties to provide the services to be published within a week.
The decision was taken at a high-level meeting chaired by Local Government and Rural Development (LG&RD) Secretary Irshad Ahmed Qureshi and attended by senior officials, mayors, district council chairmen, chief officers and other representatives of local governments.
The initiative comes five months after an integrated solid waste management project was inaugurated in Muzaffarabad in April this year.
The project had been conceived in 2016 but remained dormant for nearly a decade. Despite the launch of the project in April this year, solid waste management remains a major challenge in the city.
Under the new programme, Mr Qureshi said, government institutions would perform regulatory functions while private parties would be engaged through formal agreements for service delivery.
He said the private parties would provide machinery, vehicles and manpower wherever required under the agreements, while a uniform system of machinery and uniforms for sanitary workers wouldbe introduced across AJK.
The secretary said the government had included the Suthra Kashmir programme, establishment of green areas, purchase of new operational vehicles for solid waste management, development of model villages and measures for beautification of cities in its 100-day plan.
He said a comprehensive plan was being prepared for collection of solid waste throughout AJK in accordance with the prime minister’s special directives.
The programme would also extend to villages, where household waste would be collected in coordination with elected local government representatives, youth councillors and women councillors, he added.
Heads of the municipal bodies of Muzaffarabad, Kotli, Haveli and Sudhnoti welcomed the programme and said their institutions were willing to work with the private sector in solid waste management.
The chairmen of the district councils of Bagh and Neelum Valley highlighted the importance of including rural areas in the programme, saying solid waste management had become a major challenge for villages as well as cities.
They said elected councillors, particularly ward, youth and women councillors, would be involved in the campaign. Earlier, LG&RD Department’s Deputy Director Babar Minhas briefed participants on the existing state of solid waste management, its adverse impact on the natural environment, the ‘Suthra Punjab’ model and waste management models involving private parties in South Asia.
At the end of the meeting, chief officers also participated in group work on strengthening the institutional capacity of their respective local government institutions.