60,000 jobs
“It is difficult today to make financial estimates on what recycling can represent, but one thing is certain: if you invest 1 DH in it, you earn at least 5 DH”, continues our interlocutor, also a professor at the Hassan II University of Casablanca. For her part, Touria Sbiri, president of the Federation of recyclers, collectors and bargain hunters in Morocco (FEDERCC), is more formal: “We can create more than 60,000 jobs with recycling, through the 12 identified sectors. And these are jobs that do not require a lot of training and can have a considerable social impact”.
At a time when recycling makes it possible to produce electricity, but also fuels, operators in the sector are calling for more interest in their contribution to improving the economic situation in the current situation. “Morocco has the necessary know-how to bring out its own industry in waste recycling. Above all, we are facing an investment problem and, to a certain extent, obstacles related to the application of our policies in this area,” notes Mohamed Tahiri.
Informal
In Morocco, taking full advantage of the potential of recycling goes through several stages: successfully sorting waste, processing it and reusing it. At present, the few examples to be cited at the national level are located in Fez and Oujda.
In the latter city, an operator has even managed the feat of transforming waste into electricity, which it sells to the National Office for Electricity and Drinking Water (ONEE). On another aspect, the State is called upon to move forward in the direction of the regulation of the informal sector. “In town, the sorting exists, but it is formal on practically the entire circuit. It is only at the level of the transformer that we enter the formal,” observes Touria Sbiri. Other actions are also necessary to support innovation and encourage research centers and universities to contribute to the implementation of the waste recovery strategy.
Programme national
These actions might be of a nature to considerably increase the rate of collection and treatment of waste. According to officials, the rate of treatment of industrial waste barely exceeds 13%, while the objective is to increase this level to 40% in the coming years.
On the other hand, considerable efforts have been made to achieve an increase in the professionalized collection rate to 90%, once morest 44% in 2008, while the increase in the rate of disposal in controlled landfills and landfill and recovery centers (CEV) is currently 62.63% of household waste produced, compared to 10% before 2008.
Still according to the figures provided by the environmental protection services, the current number of controlled landfills and CEVs is 26, while that of rehabilitated landfills amounts to 66. Finally, for its part, the National Program of Household Waste (PNDM) mobilized investments of nearly 21 billion dirhams at the end of 2021, while the volume of household waste amounts to 6 million tonnes per year.
