The provincial steering committee of the Sindh Solid Waste Management Board (SSWMB) has granted an extension of three years in contracts awarded to private contractors for providing end-to-end garbage disposal services in the Malir, West, and Keamari districts of Karachi.
Sindh Local Government Minister Saeed Ghani on Saturday chaired the third session of the provincial steering committee of the SSWMB in his capacity as the chairman of the committee.
The committee also approved the proposal that the contractors engaged for providing waste disposal services in the three Karachi districts be paid their fee in the Pakistani currency instead of the US dollar.
The committee was told that the renewal of contractors would help reduce by 25 per cent the expense of waste disposal work in District Malir while the same expenditure would be slashed by 28 per cent in the case of West and Keamari districts.
The local government minister was given a detailed briefing on the occasion on the findings of a research study conducted on the waste disposal work in the three districts. The new contracts would ensure beefing up waste lifting and disposal work in these districts along with an effective monitoring system to oversee the waste management services, the meeting was told.
The committee also decided to float a tender to procure the services of a contractor in District East of Karachi. A company would provide the same services in the district till the completion of the tendering process.
A proposal came into consideration to consult town municipal corporations in Karachi to propose a fee against waste collection work in residential, commercial and industrial areas of the city to generate income for the SSWMB.
The committee approved a proposal for preparing an assessment and analysis report for waste disposal work in the Shaheed Benazirabad and Mirpurkhas districts. It also authorised the selected sanitation services company to take care of the landfill sites in Sukkur and Hyderabad.
The minister was informed that the tendering process was in progress for selecting contractors to manage Jam Chakro and Gond Pass landfill sites in Karachi. The previous company had been allowed to continue managing the city’s landfill sites till the completion of the tendering process.
The meeting was also attended by Additional Local Government Chief Secretary Syed Khalid Hyder Shah, SSWMB Managing Director Imtiaz Ali Shah, finance deputy secretary, Karachi additional commissioner-1, Shaheed Benazirabad mayor, Mirpurkhas additional deputy commissioner, local government additional secretary and Mirpurkhas municipal commissioner. The mayors of Hyderabad, Sukkur and Larkana participated in the meeting via video link.