Culture
The Developing World's Most Innovative City for Trash Management Is ... Bangalore?
The Indian city is setting itself up as a model for how struggling cities can better handle waste disposal.
BANGALORE, India – In the peak of the afternoon heat, Sami Ahmed sits in a sliver of shade. Bearded, with a Muslim prayer cap, he watches his workers wade through newspapers, plastics, metals and scores of other materials in Jolly Mohalla, a vast scrap yard in the city’s center. For three generations, his family has worked as wholesale traders, collecting recyclable materials and selling them to manufacturers. He reckons there are 250 similar traders on site now, bringing in 700 trucks filled with scrap a day. They all operate under the city’s watchful eye but without its stamp of formality.
The city, Ahmed says, cannot manage its abundant waste on its own. They need people like him.