Community groups tackle Naples' rubbish problem

Since the mid-90s, the southern Italian city of Naples and surrounding provinces have struggled with the proper disposal of trash. Tensions peaked during the hot summer of 2008, months after municipal workers refused to pick up any more garbage in part because of overflowing landfills. The Berlusconi administration took corrective action to clean up Naples after taking over Italy's government that summer, but the problem still festers and frustrates residents. Accusations of mafia involvement, government incompetence, and bureaucratic bungling have left citizens appalled, cynical, and embarrassed over the oppressive piles of rubbish that linger on city corners and under buildings' shutters. Incinerators recently built in the surrounding region of Campania only infuriate citizens who view the facilities as a ruse to dispose waste hauled in from northern Italy.

But now Neapolitans are taking their city's trash problem into their own hands. Their activism could become a template for communities around the world where municipal budgets wither, infrastructure suffers, and residents tire of government inaction or ineptitude.

Ambiente Solidale, a local civil society, is one organisation taking leadership in confronting Naples' waste management woes. Bypassing the city's trash collection system, Ambiente Solidale and other organisations distribute recycling bins to homes and businesses throughout the region. Marginalised citizens, an example of whom include local Roma, are employed as sorters to pick through glass, metal, textiles, and plastics. Efforts have like that of Ambiente Solidale have inspired some towns, such as Portici, to achieve a higher recycling rate than cities in wealthier Northern Italy.

Textile recycling, always problematic, will soon ramp up, according to Marco Traversi, director of Ambiente Solidale. Beginning this September, Ambiente Solidale will distribute over 400 bins throughout 15 municipalities in the provinces of Naples and Caserta. The goal is to collect a minimum of 2000 tons of clothing, repurpose, recycle, or resell them, and divert the unwanted items from incineration or landfill. The program promises to be a job creator, especially for unskilled workers, the disabled, and ex-convicts, all who struggle to find employment.

According Traversi, one trick to reduce municipal waste is to embed recycling as a habit with the young so it becomes second nature in adulthood. When Ambiente Solidale started in 2007, one of its first projects was collaborating with the King Midas Campania Association. Aimed primarily at elementary schoolchildren, the organisation teaches how various waste materials can be reused or recycled. Meanwhile, parents who operate businesses in Naples' Spanish Quarter have started a micro-targeted waste collection system to remove piles of waste that gather under shop windows or on homes' porches.

Other tactics like flash mobs and guerilla gardening are behind Naples' grassroots cleanup. To that end, on activist organisation, CleaNap, masters social media tools to unite cultural associations, youth groups, and environmentalists to gather quickly and complete tasks from cleaning up the city's stunning piazzas to separating heaps of rubbish. The difficulty, as explained by CleaNap's Emiliana Mellone, is to convince retailers and other business to follow fellow the lead of residents.

Another group, Friarielli Ribelli (Rebel Broccoli), unites young and old to garden as another step towards revitalising Naples. Friarielli Ribeli's self-financed activities not only have resulted in flower beds appearing throughout the city, but have also taught residents how to convert food waste into compost.

For all of these organisations, the easy work like the separation of plastic from paper has begun. Now the harder part begins: dealing with items like consumer electronics that for years have been buried or incinerated indiscriminately with other trash to the detriment of the air, water, and land. A new collection service, Reteca, will accelerate the collection of unwanted computers and other electronic gadgets; another Ambiente Solidale initiative will streamline the processing of used computer printer cartridges. Naples is searching for more ideas, however, and now international organisations view Naples as a laboratory of social innovation working to solve society's most pressing problems. Euclid Network, a London-based NGO, has organised a competition next month to help fund social entrepreneurship ventures so Naples can not only clean up, but thrive.

Leon Kaye is founder and editor of GreenGoPost.com

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