SSA chairman: Still work for private haulers

The Sanitation Service Authority (SSA) will continue to utilize the services of private waste haulers after all.

While SSA Chairman Senator Rudy Grant had previously said there would be no need to do so once the Authority obtained additional trucks, he told the Senate that position had changed.

Speaking during debate on the Returnable Containers (Amendment) Bill, 2019, Grant said there could be challenges for SSA in dealing with “yard waste” and that is where the private haulers would come in.

“I would have reported to this House before that with the full complement of garbage trucks, the SSA would no longer need to engage the private waste haulers. But we would have been having some discussion and we are exploring the possibility of using the private waste haulers to assist us in the collection of the yard waste,” he said.

“It is very important that while we have a situation where we have more garbage trucks, at the same time we would be able to deploy the private waste haulers.”

Grant referred to a 2015 study entitled The Waste Characterisation, which identified organic waste, largely ‘yard waste’, as a major contributor to overall garbage disposable.

“The Waste Characterisation Study indicated that between 25 to 41 per cent of the municipal solid waste was made up of organics, and a lot of that is yard waste. Very often, Barbadians cut the grass around their house and they bag the grass and leave the grass.

“There are times that the SSA is not able to immediately collect that yard waste. We have four private waste haulers that we are now utilizing and of course we will be working with them…,” he said.