The insularization of the garbage collection service is beginning to take shape and the Cabildo has urged all municipalities to pronounce before the end of this month, clarifying if they are going to join this initiative. "The most interested are Haría and San Bartolomé", explained the Minister of Waste, Hugo Delgado, who last week presented to the municipal officials the economic study commissioned by the Island Corporation on this project. "The ball is now in their court and they have to say who joins", he said.
In this regard, he explained that some municipalities will have to wait for the contracts currently in force to expire, although the "insularization" could begin with Haría and San Bartolomé, waiting for the rest to join. "The idea is that little by little, as the contracts are fulfilled, they will be incorporated. We have done it in phases so that each municipality can join when it can", he explained.
However, the intention is that the insularization reaches almost all municipalities from the beginning with the management of a new service, the brown container. This is intended only for organic waste, which must be separated from the rest of the common household waste, "to be able to make compost and not lose everything in Zonzamas".
"Next year it is already an obligation of the municipalities to provide that service", the counselor has advanced, clarifying that he knows that Arrecife, Tías and Teguise "do not have this fifth container" included in their contracts. Thus, for this new selective collection they could already join the island service. "Those who have recently contracted I imagine they will have it in their specifications, but others do not", he pointed out, adding that in the case of Tinajo he does not know what was included in the specifications of their last contest.
As for Arrecife and Teguise, he said that they are "very interested in the brown container, to start there and then add the rest of the waste". In this way, the insularization of the entire service could begin with two municipalities, while at least two or three more could start only with that new selective collection.
Four containers and a fifth on the way
Currently, the Cabildo already manages throughout the island the collection of both cardboard and plastic, while glass depends on the Government of the Canary Islands. The fourth container that existed until now, for general household waste, is the one managed by each municipality, mostly through external contracts that involve annual outlays of millions. And to that, we must now add a fifth, separating organic waste.
"The idea is to lower the price", stresses the counselor, adding that the reduction will be greater "the more municipalities join". In addition, among the objectives is also that there is uniformity in all the containers on the island, with the goal of "insularizing everything", both in Lanzarote and La Graciosa, so that all municipalities "have the same service".
It was the municipalities most inclined to this project that transferred the proposal months ago at a meeting of the Island Waste Board. As a result, Hugo Delgado explains that the Cabildo commissioned "an expert who is working on the Waste Plan of the Canary Islands" to conduct a study, which was the one presented last week to the municipalities.
"They went to think and take numbers to see who joins, and we agreed at the end of the month to tell us who goes and who does not go, to economically close the numbers well", he detailed. Depending on that, the specifications will be defined to call a contest, and the service would be provided as in a Consortium, where each municipality would pay the proportional part that corresponds to it.
