CAIRO: “You can recycle anything.
This bold claim, made by AUC’s Professor of Environment and Development, Salah El-Haggar, just may be Egypt’s answer to the global trend of “going green.
From cement dust, to fluorescent light bulbs, to the rice straw that, when burnt, contributes to Cairo’s infamous Black Cloud, El-Haggar says there are means to recycle it all.
More importantly, he says that there are means to recycle it all with a profit.
Egypt is somewhat notorious for high air pollution levels (notably in Cairo) and large amounts of solid waste. According to a United Nations Environmental Program report, in 2002, nearly 3.9 million tons of municipal waste were collected in Cairo alone.
According to El-Haggar, Egyptians are aware of the problems plaguing the environment in Egypt. What they are not aware of, however, is how to approach the problems, and fix them in a way that will garner financial revenue, he says.
Recent environmental research and initiatives indicate that the key to unlocking Egypt’s environmental conscience is contextualizing the problems – placing the environmental issues in a context that is more tangible and immediate, such as the economy, or charitable donations.
Resala, a charity organization founded six years ago by Cairo University students, includes an environmental branch that captures this idea of pairing revenue and recycling to pique people’s interest.
Since 2005, Resala’s environmental chapter has offered an outlet for people to donate their paper waste. The material is gathered at several collection points, which include 100 schools in Cairo. Donors can also ask Resala volunteers to pick up their paper waste by calling the organization.
The paper waste is then sold to factories, the revenue of which is used to support Resala’s charity activities. In addition, any used books collected are either sold or sent to a Resala library. Sometimes the used books and paper are used within the organization as tools for private lessons given to underprivileged children and adults, according to volunteer Mahmoud Abu-Agiza.
In one month, Resala collected about 250,000 kg of paper waste, says Abu-Agiza, a member of Resala who has been involved since the environmental branch’s formation three years ago.
“We have led a good formula by combining charity with environmental issues, he says, adding that environmental issues in Egypt are often considered “luxurious.
According to Marwa El Abd, the technical manager of Resala, “People don’t have time to be environmentally conscious in their normal daily activities, they have economic problems in everyday life, she says.
“To increase awareness we chose something related to charity, she continues.
Abu-Agiza says that three years ago, when Resala members proposed the idea of recycling paper waste to the Board of Directors, the board was initially hesitant, as Resala was a charity organization and not an environmental one.
While they didn’t reject the idea, the board did not officially approve it, as the idea was “out of scope. However, the board told the recycling team to see what they could do with it.
When the marriage between environment and charity proved successful, and the paper waste collection began to appear as a formal activity, the environmental branch was formalized in Resala after a six month pilot phase, recalls Abu-Agiza.
Today, there are 15 to 20 members in the environmental division, with 40,000 members in the entire organization.
In Resala’s community service adverts, which have been broadcasted on popular radio stations, the message is communicated through three main issues, says El-Abd, beginning with, the charity aspect, the environment, and the economic objective.
The goal is to achieve something economically positive, she says.
Resala also has plans to expand their recycling functions. The organization recently received a donation of an 8,000 square meter plot of land in the Al-Sada zone outside of Cairo, which the organization hopes to eventually use to manufacture recycled paper themselves, according to El-Abd.
There is still much work to do before this is possible – Resala still needs to do a feasibility study and obtain the equipment. The project would also require financial investments to move forward, she says.
El-Abd points out that this venture would also create job opportunities for poor families that Resala works with.
Cairo’s Black Cloud, which has plagued the city every October since 1999, can also be combated with recycling, says El-Haggar, also the vice president of the Association for the Protection of the Environment. El-Haggar, who has written numerous books on environmental issues, including Sustainable Industrial Design and Waste Management, has his own recycling lab at AUC where he develops recycling technology.
Instead of burning rice straw, which leads to the Black Cloud, he says that farmers should turn the rice straw into fertilizers, which would enable the farmers to get revenue by selling it.
To achieve this, he says initiatives must take a hands-on, practical approach, rather than the theoretical approach encompassed by pamphlets and brochures. This practical approach also involves understanding the mentality of the selected audience – explaining the issue to a street sweeper and farmer may be completely different, he says.
An upcoming initiative by the Ministry of Environment also touches on this link between economy and environment.
On July 28, the Ministry will launch an energy saving campaign with the private sector to inform people how to save energy at home through such means as Air Conditioning usage, washing machine usage, and other domestic practices. “The main objective is to motivate consumers to save energy with all the benefits that come with it. One of the benefits is the monetary benefit. The bigger role is the environmental benefit related to global warming, said Rafik Riad, the communications manager for the Environmental Sector Program at the Ministry .
“The benefit that we’re [the Ministry of Environment] looking at is the actual reduction of energy consumption, and the monetary benefit is the motivation for consumers.
He also points out initiatives being taken to counter the issue of air pollution, such as the government’s new traffic law, to be enforced in August, which has a clause about gas emissions.
All these initiatives beg the question- are the “inconvenient truths of Egypt’s environmental landscape becoming more immediate truths?
“People try to think about pollution, says El-Haggar, praising first and former Egyptian Minister for the Environment Dr. Nadia Makram Ebeid’s efforts to initiate environmental talks in Egypt, “but people resist because they don’t know the benefit.
