• According to World Health Organization, waste is defined as any substance or object arising from human or animal activities that has to be discarded as ‘unwanted’ (Economopoulos, 1993).

• Solid waste consists of the discarded portion of household material, dead animal remains, trade, commercial, agriculture & industrial waste and other large waste like debris from construction site, furniture etc.

• Solid wastes are generally categorized as:

• Municipal Solid Waste

• Hazardous Solid Waste

• Biomedical Solid Waste

• In India, as the limits of urbanization are extending to far flying areas the problem of Solid waste management is causing a great concern to our environment with the rapid industrialization and population growth, the status of our environment is degrading day by day.

• The increasing amount of solid waste generated in most of the cities is being recognized as a major health problem. In most of the cases, the toxic and hazardous waste is mixed with domestic solid waste and is disposed off in unsafe dumps without treatment.

• In Punjab, growth of population, industrialization and urbanization has resulted in generation of large volumes of solid waste. The total amount of collected solid waste from the districts includes 1108012.25 MT of municipal waste and 6695.57MT of bio-medical waste (PPCB as cited in Statistical Abstract of Punjab, 2007). The factors contributing to the generation of solid waste are : 

• The state has registered 45% increase in its population during the last decades.

• The state is the 7^th most urbanized state in the country with urban population increasing to 33.95% against a national average of 27.8%.

• The state has two (Ludhiana & Amritsar) cities with more than 1 million population

• The state supports a large number of floating population from other states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh.

• Most of the solid waste is presently disposed of on land and remains uncovered resulting in environmental pollution of surrounding area.

• The change in life style towards” consume and discard’ culture is responsible for adding to municipal solid waste and changing waste composition. It also adds pressure on the existing municipal solid waste handling infrastructure, as well as, disposal sites.

  District wise Solid Waste Collected and Treated in the Punjab State (Click Here)

References

Copyright @ 2008. PSCST all rights reserved