Hyderabad: Buoyed by the success of establishing a Swachh Badi (learning centre) in Siddipet municipality, the Municipal Administration and Urban Development department is now gearing up to set up similar learning centres in all the 142 Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) across the State by Dasara.
Swachh Badi is a learning centre, which creates awareness on waste management on sustainable basis and practice home composting, besides promoting urban farming. These centres educate people, especially children, on community level composting models and equipped with ward processing unit.
The learning centre is equipped with provisions to conduct live demonstrations on how to compost at household, community and in-situ level.
Different composting methods are also exhibited to the visitors through live demonstrations, besides sharing vendors’ information.
In addition to these facilities, there will also be art installations made out of dry waste to demonstrate the use of recycling and reuse concepts. The centre conducts “Trashnomics” programme for school children about the importance of waste management.
This initiative is being taken up following MA&UD Minister KT Rama Rao’s announcement that the State government would establish Swachh Badi in all urban local bodies at the earliest.
Speaking at the Pattana Pragathi Dinotasavam as part of Dashabdi celebrations here on Friday, the Minister recalled his visit to Swachh Badi at Siddipet, which was set up in an acre.
The good thing about Swacch Badi centres was that they train children at school level and motivate people on waste segregation and effective management.
Children would be taught all aspects pertaining to dry and wet waste segregation, advantages of segregation, how to generate compost from waste, reduce, recycle and reuse concepts, he said.
Every day, at least 50 school children would be made to visit the Swacch Badi. More importantly, these centres teach about avoiding plastic and promote usage of steel utensils for daily use, he added.
To this effect, the MA&UD department has engaged Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI) for extending technical assistance to ULBs in setting up the Swachh Badi. Similarly, Dr. Shanti Tummala of Solid Waste Management Round Table from Bengaluru is being engaged as consultant for executing the project.