Material Recovery Facility to come up at Dakshina Kannada village

If everything goes as per the plan, a material recovery facility (MRF) will come up at Thenka Edapadavu in Mangaluru taluk.

The tender has been finalised and work on the facility will begin soon, Dakshina Kannada Zilla Panchayat (DKZP) Chief Executive Officer Dr Kumar told DH when contacted. Initially, land for MRF was identified in Gunjimutt on city's outskirts. Following stiff opposition from the public, officials had to shift the MRF to Thenka Edapadavu.

In fact, the government had proposed to set up a MRF under the Swachh Bharat Mission at four places including Dakshina Kannada district. The facility in Udupi had begun functioning from Nitte recently. The third MRF was to come up in Ramanagaram and fourth MRF in Ballari. The MRF would reduce the burden of dry waste segregation at gram panchayats besides adding value to dry waste.

Gram Panchayats at present segregate dry waste at their solid waste management facility using manual labour and later sell it to scrap dealers. Once MRF is set up, the processed waste at the facility will directly reach the end user for recycling. MRF facility has different machines like bailing machine, shredder machine, among others and the dry waste will be segregated into various categories, said sources.

CEO Kumar said no wet waste will be stored in the facility. Once commissioned, it can process around 10 tonnes of dry waste per day. “The dry waste will be collected from 35 to 40 villages in the nearby gram panchayats enroute to the MRF,” the CEO added. Department of Rural drinking water and Sanitation, department of Rural Development and Panchayat Raj had declared that authorities should ensure that no inflammable items were stored.

The dry waste should be kept in an organised manner and no waste should be burnt at the facility. As part of the setting up of MRF, volunteers from Saahas from Bengaluru had taken up a survey at gram panchayats in Mangaluru and Bantwal taluk, sources added.

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