Environmental Issues

One of my new mzungu friends, 19-year old Katharina from Germany, has been in a very emotional state since her arrival in Uganda because of her malaria pills. So when she started, “You guys! You know what I had to do last night?” with a quiver in her voice, I just smiled and wondered if tears would accompany the story.

“I had to take out the garbage,” she continued.

What could possibly be so terrible about that? thought I.

“I just walked out the door, went to the green area beside my house and just dumped it there. On the green space! And now MY garbage is just lying on top of the pile, for all to see! I feel so terrible.”

True, Uganda lacks a garbage collection system and I think they desperately need one. People burn it or dump their garbage on communal heaps within the towns. If people unwrap a straw, open a bottle or unwrap a candy or banana, the garbage immediately gets tossed on the floor of your house, on the ground or out the car window. This act of inbred littering makes most mzungus cringe, especially Nina, a 25 year-old German girl who is here to implement a high school environmental conservation program.

And then there are the cars – many blow out black exhaust, which is absolutely normal here, and which can cause a shock to the body when exposed to Kampala traffic for the first time.

Yet while it seems like environmental standards are substandard here, the people of Uganda, and probably Africa at large, produce less garbage than people in the developing world. The food here is mostly organic (meaning less chemical fertilizers), many people grow their own food (meaning less packaging), more people walk or use public means of transport (albeit not by choice), they recycle to a limited extent (you can buy used plastic water bottles for 200 shillings on the market) and they lack a culture of consumerism. This is especially noticeable when entering someone’s house – Ugandan homes are sparsely decorated, if at all, and are quite empty for Western standards. As far as decoration goes, the most common elements are old calendars, newspaper pages and cheesy photographs. The amount of “stuff” I have in Canada could fill at least 20 Ugandan homes, according to the general standard here.

Even my ecological footprint has gone down since I arrived in Uganda, but this is mainly because I have been using my things sparingly since I don’t want them to run out. While things like shampoo and conditioner do exist here, they are expensive and the selection isn’t very good, since most Africans don’t wash their hair like mzungus do. So I've been using the same small bottle of shampoo since I've arrived, and I actually think it will last.

But back to the garbage - maybe living so close to your garbage is a good thing. It reminds you (or at least me), that I should produce less waste. In the West the reality of our consumption and waste is all too hidden in wastefills far away from our homes.