The trash in Mali’s capital is piling up. Donkey carts are coming to help

BAMAKO, Mali (AP) — When handling the garbage of a city of over 3 million people and equipped with little more than a face mask and gloves, it helps to have a sense of humor. Yacouba Diallo decided to name the two donkeys that pull his cart after his cousins, Keita and Kanté. Hauling garbage in Mali’s capital, Bamako, can be otherwise grim. In addition, “it requires less investment than a truck,” Diallo said. Advocacy groups allege that some of the animals are overburdened, work long days and have little protection from walking on broken glass around dump sites. Ideally, the garbage collected from Bamako’s streets is meant to be deposited in a transfer site and then taken to a landfill. But the city doesn’t have sites that meet required standards, said Bamadou Sidibé, a waste management consultant. “All the institutions that have to deal with the waste problem are not playing their part,” he said. Donkeys pull a cart to collect household waste at the Badalabougou garbage dump site in Bamako, Mali, on July 10, 2024. “Bamako is dirty because people don’t care about the environment or their health,” asserted Adama Kanté, a deputy mayor. Donkeys pull a cart to collect household waste at the Badalabougou garbage dump site in Bamako, Mali, on July 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Moustapha Diallo) “Instead of hiring a garbage collector who has to be paid, a lot of people wait until the rainy season to throw their garbage into the running water. Until solutions are put in place, the garbage mounds in Bamako have attracted some residents who risk their health and safety searching through them for items to reuse or sell. It’s a common scene in some African capitals and one that can turn deadly: Earlier this month, a vast landfill in Uganda’s capital collapsed, killing at least 30 people. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org. – This Summarize was created by Neural News AI (V1). Source: https://apnews.com/140215d44346e9a60556f557b2f41e49