Plastic pollution plagues chad, yet solutions are at hand

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Author: Michael Stanley-Jones, Sustainability and Capacity Building Advisor -CRF Italy

Since the 1950s, production of plastics has grown to such a degree that by 2017 global annual production of plastics (including plastic in synthetic textiles) equaled the global human biomass (Lebreton, L., Andrady, A., 2019).  With this increase in production has come exponential growth in the amount of plastic waste found on the globe. Today, we produce about 400 million tonnes of plastic waste every year (UNEP, 2021), of which 9 to 14 million tonnes, carried mainly by rivers, find their way to the sea. And not only are humans being surpassed by plastics. The mass and abundance of drifting plastic items in the Austria‘s Danube River were found in 2015 to be higher than those of larval fish (Lechner, A., et al. (2015).  Plastic is the greatest monster found in today’s seas.

Africa has not escaped this explosion of plastic waste. Comprising less than 17% of the world’s population, Africa consumes just 4% of global plastic volumes. Even at this relatively low level of consumption, the continent generated a total of 19 million tonnes of plastic waste in 2015, of which 17 million tonnes were mismanaged. The cost of plastic pollution in Africa places serious burdens on its countries, impacting their health, livelihoods, greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity and ecosystems (Sadan, Z. and De Kock, L., 2021).

This is dramatically illustrated by the case of Chad, a landlocked country in the centre of the semiarid region of western and north-central Africa known as the Sāḥil, which ironically means ʻcoast’ or ʻshore’ in Arabic. Chad lies largely in the Chad Basin, the largest enorheic basin – one that has no outlet to the sea – in Africa.

Studies have estimated the economic damages wrought by marine plastic pollution at global and regional levels and to specific economic sectors, such as fisheries and tourism. Little research to date has addressed the effects of plastic waste in inland environments. A 2022 World Bank case study estimated the economic damages caused by the inappropriate disposal of plastic waste in an urban area of a developing country—N’Djamena, the capital of Chad, seeks to fill this gap (Croitoru, L., et al., 2022).

The study’s authors examined 380 households in proximity to N’Djamena‘s Canal des Jardiniers, which crosses the city center from the south to the north. The area lacked a solid waste disposal facility and portion of the area’s solid waste regularly ends up in in the canal. About a third of the solid waste clogging the canal was comprised of plastics.

Obstruction of the canal by solid waste contributed to water flooding a vast area around the canal during the torrential rains of August 2020.  The inappropriate disposal of solid waste had also led to the depreciation of the value of the houses located in the proximity of the canal.

The residents living by the canel were also found to have experienced higher incidences of disease (malaria, diarrhea, and dysentery). The total number of cases due to canal obstruction was estimated at roughly 6,900. Treating these illnesses placed a financial burden on these households, as did lost wages due to having to stay home to care for sick children and the loss of income among sick adults who could not work.

The proximity to the obstructed canal, the study found, explains the high occurrence of disease, the large decline in house values, and the severe flood damages. Households living within 20 meters of the canal bear more than 75% of the total plastic damage. For the whole study area, which was divided into three zones at different distances from the canal, this damage averages to US$800 per household. Overall, the economic cost corresponds to more than US$3000/ton of plastic waste in 2020.  The estimated damage is substantially higher than the average impact of solid waste estimated for N’Djamena at US$60/ton per year by a different study.

Solutions for N’Djamena and other urban areas’s waste management challenges are at hand.

Among the priority areas for future work, the authors recommend identifying and cleaning up N’Djamena‘s hotspot areas of solid waste (including plastic), reinforcing the municipal decree prohibiting the use of plastic bags, supporting waste recycling, and promoting the reuse of recycled products.

As a longer-term solution, N’Djamena should invest in more solid waste collection points and sanitary landfills. Partnerships between the Société Tchadienne d’Industrie et de Plastique, which is currently the only plastic recycling firm in Chad, and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) could support this infrastructure.

On current trends, globally the amount of plastic waste entering aquatic ecosystems could nearly triple to a projected 23-37 million tonnes per year by 2040. Plastic pollution represents failures at every stage of the plastics life cycle: from raw material extraction to polymer production and product design, to consumption and waste collection, to the management of plastic after use.

There is as yet no global instrument in place to comprehensively tackle plastic pollution across the full plastics life cycle using circular economy principles. One may be on its way. In February 2022, governments meeting at the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA-5.2) adopted a historic resolution to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, with the ambition to complete the negotiations by end of 2024.

Coordinated efforts to control plastic production, decrease consumption, and promote reuse and recycling at national, regional and international levels will be needed to secure a sustainable future for the people of Chad and for the planet.

References

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