When The Environmental Health and safety Unit introduced the Ghana-Polluter Pay Principle (PPP), they believed that it was the answer to waste generation and management. The PPP according to a Snr. Lecturer Mr D.K Twerefou, University of Ghana ‘is a civil and social act that would enable economic agents as well as individuals to pay for waste they produce daily’.
The initiative from the Environmental Services Providers Association was to provide the opportunity for waste generators to contribute to sustainable financing of waste management, and mobilise additional revenue for environmental management. The initiative was supposed to help reduce pollution, provide incentive to control and clean pollution, including waste management, recycling, reuse as well as recovery of waste. It appears that reverse is the case for residents of the adenta aviation road where Zoomlion has a Polluter Pay as you dump Site. The Pay as you dump concept works like the Polluter-Pays Principle where residents pay before they are allowed to dump their solid waste at communal sanitary sites. The waste collected at this sites are then conveyed to a recycling place or a landfill. In the case of the adenta aviation residents, the waste is burnt there in the night, when the people are supposed to be sleeping and this has been going on every night unless it is raining.
The Implication of this impunity by zoomlion is as follows:
Air pollution: Burning waste produces smoke, especially if it is damp and smouldering
burning plastic, rubber or painted material not only creates an unpleasant smell but also produces a range of poisonous compounds.
Health Problems: Just opposite the place is a maternity center, and this causes detrimental health effects. Smoke may cause problems for asthmatics, bronchitis sufferers, people with heart conditions and children.
Stress: it causes annoyance to residents who hope to sleep peacefully after a day hard work but can’t because the air is not clean.
Finally, In environmental law, the polluter pays principle is enacted to make the party responsible for producing pollution responsible for paying for the damage done to the natural environment. In this situation, I smell corruption somewhere and this requires thorough investigation.
1. If the waste to be removed is burnt at the site, what happens to the budget provided for transportation of waste to its destination?
2. Are there no supervisors who monitor the operations of this Polluter pay as you dump sites? And this person has not noticed that the soil is now black from consistent burning?
Zoomlion is responsible for this air pollution in the adenta aviation area. In their bid to do big things, they have neglected the small and simple things which matter most. The residents will be grateful that this stops so that their peace and health will be guaranteed.

Source:Chuks Ineh- adentan.com