15 months after its implementation, the 10GP per litre Sanitation and Pollution Levy on petroleum products has amassed earnings of more than GH196.5 million.
Despite the influx, the provost of the University of Ghana's College of Education, Professor Martin Oteng-Ababio, stated that the country's sanitation sector faced a grim future owing to policy shortcomings throughout the years.
He noted, for instance, that despite the government having imposed a 10 percent Environmental Excise Tax (EET) on plastic manufacturers earlier in 2011 in an effort to raise money to address the plastic menace, it was impossible to determine with any degree of certainty how much money had accrued to the fund and how it had been applied to address the problem.
The goal of the sanitary levy is to raise money for infrastructure purchases in the sanitation industry.
In his inaugural lecture at the University of Ghana, Legon, titled "Double standards, one purpose: dismantling the fence wall for sustainable urban trash management," Prof. Oteng-Ababio made the remarks.
Prof. Oteng-Ababio traced the development of Ghana's waste management systems from the colonial era to the present while critically evaluating policy options, saying that while the nation had over 136 waste policies, the majority of them were "inappropriate, misplaced, irrelevant, and harmful," highlighting the fact that most of them were political in nature.
"I provide consulting services to the majority of the major waste management and sanitation firms. They tremble whenever a new administration comes into power because if they invest in waste management technology and there are political problems, they might end up in difficulty "explained he.
Additionally, he looked at how garbage has been defined, conceptualised, created, and handled in modern metropolitan settings and across many cultural traditions.
The lecture took as its premise that the rate of urban growth, the degree of development, the dynamics of climate change, and the potential for advancing human-centered and environmentally friendly management futures were all inextricably linked to municipal waste management.
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