What’s in a Name? Clarity

As the work program of The Africa Stockpiles Programme expands, there is growing interest in the partnership. So, if you’re looking for a basic description – or, passport text – of ASP, here it is:

The Africa Stockpiles Programme (ASP) is a multi-stakeholder partnership created in response to requests by African countries seeking assistance with the safe handling and elimination of obsolete pesticide stockpiles. Among these obsolete pesticides are Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), a class of chemicals that poses serious threats to human health, livestock, wildlife, and the environment. The prevention of new accumulation of stockpiles is also a key component of the programme. The ASP receives funding from the Global Environment Facility (GEF), various bilateral donors, the plant science industry and civil society. This innovative programme works with African countries to help meet their obligations under the Stockholm Convention on POPs (www.pops.int). The ASP is implemented through a partnership presently including several African countries, the World Bank, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the plant science industry (CropLife International), and civil society (Pesticide Action Network- PAN Africa and PAN UK; World Wide Fund for Nature -WWF).

More information on the ASP is available at www.africastockpiles.net

Overview of ASP in South Africa

The ASP-South Africa partnership was launched in June 2006 with the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEAT) as the national executing agency. Following consultations held in nine South African provinces, a pilot project was initiated in Limpopo, as this largely agricultural province was expected to have significant levels of obsolete and unwanted stocks on commercial farms. Overall project funding of Rand 13.9 million is provided by the World Bank (Rand 12 million), DEAT (Rand 0.6 million) and CropLife International (Rand 1.3 million).

By mid 2007, the pilot project had achieved success and over 80 tonnes of obsolete and unwanted pesticides had been collected. These stocks were inventoried and safeguarded by a professional hazardous waste management contractor, and are currently held in interim storage at the Holfontein hazardous waste landfill in Gauteng province. An additional 20 tonnes of obsolete pesticide stocks collected through an NGO-led initiative called “Project Operation Wagtail” in 2001 were added to the Limpopo stocks, increasing the collection to approximately 100 tonnes.

Upon examination, some of these wastes were found to be of a non-hazardous nature, suitable for land-filling or being processed in South Africa itself. The project’s objective is to organise the export and safe destruction overseas of the larger hazardous proportion of the wastes. Funding for this operation is being provided by CropLife International, as part of its overall commitment to the ASP partnership.

South Africa plans to move to a long-term solution for the management of obsolete and unwanted pesticides. The intention is to use remaining ASP funds as seed funding for the development of the long-term solutions, in line with requirements of the soon–to-be enacted Waste Management Bill. This legislation puts emphasis on producer responsibility and development of waste management plans by industries whose wastes have been identified as those needing priority attention in terms of environmentally-sound management.

Systems have been studied for the implementation of sustainable solutions for the management of unwanted pesticides and empty containers in Australia, Canada and France. A fact finding mission to Australia, with funding from CropLife International and the World Bank, was undertaken in August 2008 to gather first-hand information on the set-up and governance of the Australian ‘AgSafe’ operation, including the roles and capacities of different stakeholders in implementing the scheme, and a review of the project’s financial sustainability.

The long term solutions being actively considered for South Africa would potentially involve using existing structures, or establishing a not-for-profit non-governmental agency. Such an agency (a Section 21 company under SA law) would be tasked with organising a system of collection points and a schedule of regular collections and disposals of unwanted pesticides in the country. Discussions with the pesticide industry are underway and expressions of commitment have been received.

At the same time, an assessment of the hazardous waste destruction technology available in South Africa will be conducted so that, once a long-term solution for pesticides management is in place, cost-effective disposal of unwanted wastes can be carried out nationally into the foreseeable future.

For more information, www.deat.gov.za