The Oman Environmental Services Holding Company, (be’ah) has set an ambitious goal to reduce the amount of municipal waste and divert 60 per cent of solid waste by 2025 and 80 per cent by 2030 from engineered landfills in the Sultanate of Oman. The company has worked on many plans and studies to implement the recycling process of waste of economic value such as construction and demolition waste, scrap tyres, lead acid batteries and so on, in line with sustainability goals, according to a report in Times of Oman.

“The company sought during the last few years, after completing the readiness of facilities in various governorates, to transfer the municipal solid waste management sector from various municipalities to specialised international companies, and the transfer was completed by the end of 2020 to include 100 percent of the population of the Sultanate of Oman. As a result, several transportation and waste collection management operations and management of various facilities were transferred to specialised international companies,” Fahd bin Ali Al Kharusi, Head of the Planning Department in the Municipal Waste Sector at be’ah was quoted as saying.

be’ah is currently managing many waste sites, including 10 engineering landfills and 16 transformational stations, and the company applies “sustainable solid waste management policies to prevent resource depletion, so as to create a sustainable economy or what is known as the ‘circular economy’”, he added. He also pointed out that there were other studies carried out by the company to recycle waste and benefit from it locally and achieve the principles of environmental sustainability and reduce pressure on the extraction of land resources.

Al Kharusi said the company, as a first step, has worked to improve appropriate infrastructure for waste management through construction of engineering landfills and new waste transfer stations in accordance with internationally recognised standards. This is preparatory to closing all landfill sites spread across Oman. He  called upon the agricultural sector to dispose of wastes in a sound manner and institutions operating in industrial zones to abide by the laws regulating the process of collection of industrial waste from various zones, and the contractors to dispose of construction and demolition waste at the designated places and not follow random dumping practices, stated the report.