Cameroon Turns Hazard Into Convenience

Cameroon is fighting against floods by recycling plastic waste into building blocks.

- Aaron Yancho Kaah

A SMALL-SCALE scheme of paying young unemployed residents of Cameroon’s capital to collect plastic bottles and bags that clog the drains and exacerbate flooding is slowly turning out to be the city’s solution to tackle the litter. The project is recycling the plastic waste into building blocks besides battling a rainfall which is already unusually high due to seasonal changes.

The country’s legendary footballer, Albert Roger Milla, whose hip-shaking dance moves propelled him to international fame at the 1990 World Cup, set up Coeur d‘Afrique (Heart of Africa) in 2014 after his retirement. The organisation aims to help solve four of Cameroon’s major problems— youth unemployment, plastic waste pollution, flooding and structures that are not environment-friendly.

It launched an intiative the same year under which it pays around 300 street children and unemployed youths of various affected neighbourhoods in the flood-prone capital Yaoundé to collect plastic from garbage cans, gutters and streams. The organisation operates in association with local councils and a contracted garbage collection company, Hysacam. Its employees work three days a week for 2,500 CFA francs (US $5) per day in a place where average income is less than 500 CFA francs (US $1) per day.

“We are mostly involving street children in the trainings to not only fight against floods but also to get them out of the streets,” Milla told Cameroon Radio Television. The footballer, now 66-year old, holds the record for being the oldest goal scorer in World Cup history at age 42.