As garbage continues to pile up around the country due to the chronic shortage of garbage trucks, five private waste haulers are offering a lending hand to Government’s clean up efforts.
The truckers, Jose Y Jose, Project Recycle, Williams Tools, Garbage Master and Forde Trucking and Bob Cat Services, said they would offer their services for free to clear the refuse “that has become an eyesore to many residents and businesses across the island,” according to a release from the Waste Haulers Association.
However, the initiative would require some effort on the part of Government, which is being asked to provide fuel for the trucks, as well as the manpower to do the loading. The Sanitation Service Authority (SSA) is also being asked to state which routes need the most urgent attention.
In statement released this afternoon, Chairman of the Waste Haulers Association Anderson Fat Child Cherry explained what evoked the sense of civic duty among the haulers.
“The haulers are making themselves available to give their services for free, to assist the truck-strapped Sanitation Services Authority remove the refuse that has become an eyesore to many residents and businesses across the island,” Cherry said.
He said the haulers were aware that Government was trying its best to get the issue addressed, “but we are also conscious that they are challenged at this time, so here we are ready and willing to assist”.
Cherry added that the haulers believed “this will be to the benefit of all Barbadians. A clean environment, one that is free from all pests and rodents”.
Back in 2016, with the pile up of garbage reaching the tipping point, the SSA and private waste haulers agreed a scheme to improve the island’s waste collection.
The plan, which involved the troubled SSA outsourcing its garbage collection on some routes to private waste haulers, had received the backing of the then Opposition Barbados Labour Party (BLP), but was fiercely condemned by the National Union of Public Workers, which saw it as the privatization of the SSA through the back door.
Soon after taking up the reins of power following its May 24 general election victory.
Minister of the Environment and National Beautification Trevor Prescod said at the end of May he was not in a position to decide on the future of the arrangement, even after having met with senior officials of the garbage collection agency.
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