Plastic Waste: The Mess of Our Time

Can you remember the last time you went for shopping? Did you get one of those black polythene bags to carry the goods you bought? When you took the polythene bag home, it turned from a container for the goods you purchased into waste; how did you dispose of it?    In this report, our Correspondent Joseph Ziem examines what has gone wrong with the obsessive use of plastic materials especially polythene bags by residents in the Tamale Metropolis and Ghanaians in general.

Mahama Yusif is one of many peasant farmers who own a farm at Gbalahi, a rural community in the North-Eastern part of Tamale. These farmlands lay closer to the city’s only landfill site, thus are exposed to constant pollution through plastic waste. 

He told Savannahnews in an interview that, before they till or prepare their farmlands for sowing, they have to pick the polythene bags which have filled almost the entire place otherwise the soil will prove less fertile or supportive to crops when they germinate.

“Crops are not as strong as usual when they germinate. This is because the polythene bags prevent their roots from permeating deep into the soil and when that happens, it disturbs the crops health”, he said. 

Too many plastic wastes on a farmland obviously affects crop cultivation in many ways according to an officer in charge of Plant Protection at the Northern Regional Directorate of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, Christopher Yerikari Akai.

“If you take the soil life—we have micro organisms that are living in the soil and some are very beneficial to the growth of crops....we have the very common ones we call earthworm ….all these are beneficial organisms in the soil and when they are prevented from getting sufficient air...they will also not exist and their very important role in soil nutrients formation will be affected”, Christopher explained. 

In Ghana, the minimum market price for a polythene bag is five pesewas making it affordable for traders and other sellers to serve their customers by using it to wrap the goods they buy. According to Salamatu, a shop owner in Tamale “when someone buys something from you, you just put what the person bought inside a polythene bag and off he/she goes... because it’s affordable as compared to baskets which many can’t buy”.

Polythene bags were introduced into the Ghanaian society few decades ago to replace paper bags which were used for packing light items. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) – Accra, the nation’s capital alone generates as much as 270 tonnes of plastic wastes every day.

Jimah Loury, a Programmes Officer at the Northern Regional office of the EPA, said plastic materials take a longer period to decompose, depending on the type of plastic. “Research has shown that it is not something that easily degrades....it is not biodegradable. Some research says it takes between 50 and 400 years to degrade.....so excessive plastic use can cause a lot of environmental problems”, he stated. 

The Director of Waste Management, Tamale Metropolitan Assembly, Sampson Akwertey in an interview disclosed that, the city generates about 250 tonnes of solid waste daily and out of this, plastic waste constitutes nearly 50 percent.

 “There have been some efforts to look at what we can do about plastics”, he said, adding “Tamale has a small recycling plant owned by a private person who currently collects only the degradable materials to produce compost manure while plastic materials are used to fill the land”, Sampson noted.

Currently, it cost the Tamale Metropolitan Assembly over GH¢2.5 million each year on waste management alone. This is expected to bloat in the coming years especially because some residents have adopted an indiscipline posture towards good sanitary practices. When walking through houses in the city, it is common to see polythene bags littered almost everywhere and choked in gutters. The little rainfall, and there is deluge or stagnant water serving as breeding grounds for mosquitoes. 

Arguably, the dirtiest vicinities in Tamale could include the following: Tishegu/Ward K, Kalpohini/Sangani, Kukuo, Duanayili, Changli, Gumani, Jisonaayili, Kanvilli, Vitting, Dabokpa, Koblimahagu, Sakasaka, Nyohini, Lamashegu, Gumbihini, Gurugu, Tamale Polytechnic, Choggu, Bulpiela, Zogbeli, Nyanshegu, jakarayili, among others. Polythene bags are engulfing these places by the day.

It is therefore not surprising that, the plastic wastes situation has caught the eye of President John Mahama as he recently expressed grave concern over what he described as a social problem. “We are drowning in plastics....if we can’t find the solution we might have to ban it completely. It has polluted our environment and this is not only an urban phenomenon…you go to the smallest village in this country and there are plastics lying all over the place”, he lamented.

According to Jimah, plastic wastes affect the beauty of the land. “Everywhere, there is plastic....no tourist will like to visit this country in future because our beaches are now full of plastic wastes ....and this doesn’t  speak well of Ghana”.

But what is the alternative? A lecturer in Environmental Practice at the Tamale Polytechnic Abudu Abdul Ganiyu, suggested a return to the old ways. “I remember growing up as a child, anytime my mother was going to the market she carried with her a basket. That basket could be made of wood or plastic but at the end of the day it is not something that could easily be disposed off. So she buys everything at the market square, covers it with a neat cloth and brings it home.”  

However, Jimah of the EPA rather thinks that introducing a tax system on plastic products like it exists in other countries, would discourage people from using polythene bags.