Feni starts producing fertiliser from garbage
This initiative will relieve Feni dwellers from the stench of garbage, financially benefit Municipality
The Feni municipality produces some 70 – 80 tonnes of waste everyday. Due to unplanned urbanisation, the trash ends up in large piles on street sides.
A company called Shebok Agrovet Limited has recently started production of organic fertiliser from the town's garbage as part of the project "Programmatic CDM-II using Municipal Organic Waste" approved by the Department of Environment under the Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change.
As part of the project, an organic fertiliser production plant has been constructed on about 70 acres of land in the city's Sultanpur area. The site has some 19 units for storing garbage. Work on the centre began on 7 October 2018 with a funding of Tk1.56 crore from the Climate Change Fund.
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During a visit on Saturday, this correspondent saw that the production centre was buzzing with activity. A group of workers were unloading waste from a van. Another group was separating non-biodegradable waste from the garbage pile under the supervision of the company's manager (Operations) NurulAbsar.
Khaled Amin, managing director, ShebokAgrovet Limited, said the company went into production with Feni's garbage waste on 15 July this year. He said the plant can produce some 1,000 kilograms of fertiliser every day from about eight tons of waste.
"But we are getting only about one ton of waste every day right now from the municipality. So, we are only producing 200 kilograms of fertiliser per day," he said.
Amin added that per packet of fertiliser produced by his company has been priced at Tk45, and the target customers are the local farmers.
The secretary of Feni Municipality Syed AbujarGifari said the municipality recently signed an agreement with the Department of Environment and ShebokAgrovet. As per the agreement, ShebokAgrovet will produce fertiliser for the next three years.
The mayor of Feni Municipality Nazrul Islam Swapan Miyaji is optimistic about the project. He said the initiative can also help reduce pollution in the area.
