Visit-Montenegro.com : A Recycling Center in Igalo Soon

Herceg Novi – Since the beginning of the year, estimated 570 tons of paper and around 120 tons of plastic has been selected and sold.

Paper is bough by company “Neutron” from Bosnian town of Maglaj at the price of Euro 50 per ton, while the plastic had been bought by a company from Slovenia, which has been paying Euro 420 per a ton for chopped up plastics and Euro 240 for pet packaging.

“Selective deposition, which also considers the use of waste, lessens the quantity of waste which is being taken to the central deposition site at Dugonji in Uble”, Director of “City Maintenance”, Borivoje Bonic stated.

He explained that such action also lessens the fuel expenses for vehicles used for the transportation of garbage to a deposition ground which is 17 kilometers away, but first and foremost, they contribute to the preservation of environment. Inhabitants of Herceg Novi produce around 13,000 tons of waste.

“Plan envisages increase of capacity for the existing recycling station in the Service zone in Igalo to 450 square meters and its’ reconstruction into a recycling center. Idea-project has been completed. Judging by the estimates, building of this space would require investment of Euro 280,000. Necessary equipment would cost additional Euro 400 to 600,000”, Bonic stated.

“Service Center should be completed by March of next year, so that Herceg Novi would become the first Municipality in Montenegro implementing a project of waste separation and its’ recycling.

Aim of the project, which is being implemented for the second consecutive year, is to decrease the amount of waste, which is being taken away to the waste-ground, by 40 percent.

Sea is Full of Garbage

Each year, 13 billion plastic bags are obtained by the inhabitants of the planet, or 220 plastic bags per capita. On the average, they are used for 12 minutes, after which they are thrown away. Nature takes centuries to get rid of this waste, or between 500 to 700 years.

Law which will forbid the use of plastic bags will go into power in the EU in 2010. Most of its’ member-states are using paper bags for some time now.

During the 1990, an action had been launched in Herceg Novi, which aimed at replacing plastic bags in the shops for the paper ones. War in former Yugoslavia and omnipresent economic crisis brought this action to an end.

Around 10 percent of world’s plastic ends up in seas and oceans. Each year, around one million sea-birds and around 100,000 sea-mammals die after they choke with plastics or get trapped in it.

Fishermen and scuba-divers repeatedly warn against the dangers of plastics which is being thrown to Boka Bay and appeal to those citizens who do that to start acting in line with the natural order. Quite recently, a floating pile of garbage has been spotted in the Pacific Ocean, which had size of Texas. This pile has been called “trash vortex.”

(8 October 2008)

By: S.K.