The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahangara Palike (BBMP) has proposed a Solid Waste Management (SWM) Cess of ₹100 per month for each household. While the proposal has sparked debate and criticism among residents and stakeholders, it is important to understand the rationale behind SWM cess, its intended use, and the broader context of solid waste management challenges faced by Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) in India.
Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) levy user fees or SWM cess as per the provisions of Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016. According to these guidelines, ULBs must collect user fees/cess for SWM services provisions provided. While there is no specified rate, ULBs typically charge about ₹30-50 per month as SWM cess, which is collected along with property tax. ULBs are now considering revising these rates and imposing higher charges on bulk waste generators to meet a portion of the costs incurred in providing SWM services.
The financial strain of solid waste management
SWM is one of the key services provided by ULBs in India. Offering SWM services is complex and resource intensive. ULBs typically deploy about 80% of their manpower and up to 50% of their annual budgets to provide SWM services to city residents. They invest heavily in capital costs, including the procurement of vehicles, setting up transfer stations and processing facilities. Additionally, significant operational cost go towards salaries for staff engaged in door-to-door waste collection, sweepers, drivers, and processing plant operations.
In a city like Bengaluru, an urban resident generates about 0.6 kg of waste per day, totalling approximately 0.2 tonnes per person per year. Overall, Bengaluru generates about 5,000 tonnes of solid waste per day. Managing this volume of waste requires around 5,000 waste collection vehicles, 600 compactors, and about 20,000 pourakarmikas.
SWM services broadly consists of four components: collection, transportation, processing and disposal. ULBs typically package collection and transportation together, and processing and disposal together. Collection and transportation are resource and labour-intensive and consumes up to 85-90% of the SWM budget, whereas only about 10-15% is spent on processing and disposal of waste.
Operational and revenue challenges
Although ULBs spend significantly on SWM services, there is no guaranteed revenue from these services. Solid waste generated in Indian cities consists of about 55-60% wet biodegradable material and 40-45% non-biodegradable material. The portion of recyclable material in the dry waste is minimal, only about 1-2%, with the rest being mostly non-recyclable and non-biodegradable waste. Although 55% of the wet waste can be converted into organic compost or biogas, the yield is as low as 10-12%, making both composting and biogas generation from solid waste financially unviable. Typically, operational revenue from waste processing facilities covers only about 35-40% of operational expenses, with the rest subsidised by the ULB. Most wet waste processing facilities operate on either tipping fees, paid by the government to the plant operator to meet the operational deficits, or funds allocated from the municipality’s general expenditure.
Apart from financial challenges, ULBs face other challenges associated with SWM services, such as extra work of clearing open points and drains, preventing open littering, seasonal changes in waste generation, and sweeping operations. Operating waste processing plants is more challenging due to a lack of financial viability, insufficient segregation at source, and
a limited market for finished products. Additionally, the disposal of non-compostable and non-recyclable dry waste, such as single-use plastic, textile waste and inert materials, is expensive since the material needs to be shipped to cement factories or waste-to-energy projects located about 400-500 km from cities.
Large cities like Bengaluru spend about 15% of their budget—about ₹1,643 crore out of ₹11,163 crore as per BBMP’s 2023-24 budget—whereas the revenue from SWM services, apart from the grants received, is almost negligible at ₹20 lakh per year. Smaller cities tend to spend up to 50% of their budget but also end up with almost negligible revenue. Given this background, ULBs face serious challenges in allocating resources for sustained SWM services. Hence, ULBs charge SWM cess to cover a portion of the costs incurred in offering SWM services to waste generators.
Strategies to reduce operational expenditure
Although collection and transportation of waste generate no revenue, several strategies can reduce overall expenditure on SWM and lower user charges.
Segregation of waste at source: Segregated waste can increase yields from composting operations up to 20% and send more dry waste for recycling. This can reduce operational costs, though significant effort is needed to ensure compliance and behavioural change.
Reducing single-use plastic: The increase in non-recyclable single-use plastics has posed significant challenges for ULBs. This material is bulky, adding to the transportation costs to send it to cement factories or waste-to-energy projects. Reducing single-use plastics can reduce operating costs.
Decentralised composting initiatives: Residents in urban areas often oppose large-scale composting facilities due to odour and leachate issues. Cities in Tamil Nadu and Kerala have successfully implemented Micro Composting Centers (MCCs) at the ward level, processing wet waste locally and reducing transportation costs.
Information, Education and Awareness (IEC) to prevent open littering: Cities spend extensive resources on sweeping roads and clearing drains of waste, with approximately, two-thirds of staff is deployed for these tasks. Implementing IEC activities to prevent littering and improper waste disposal can reduce labour needs for these tasks, allowing their redeployment to waste processing and value recovery, which is currently neglected.
Bulk waste generators to process their own waste: Large institutions with adequate space can set up in-house waste processing facilities. This reduces the load on ULBs and helps waste generators maintain cleaner and greener premises.
Reducing operational costs incurred by ULBs requires substantial effort and cooperation from ULBs, waste generators and residents. Providing efficient SWM services without generating revenue poses a serious challenge to financially constrained ULBs. A balanced approach, combining marginal user charges with efficient operations, could help us make our cities cleaner and liveable.
Pushkara S.V. works with the Indian Institute for Human Settlements, Bengaluru, and is a practitioner in SWM with about 15 years of experience in setting up and operating waste-processing facilities.
