The ManicaPost
Tendai Gukutikwa
Post Reporter
MANY times she has to fight off the city’s refuse collection employees over refuse from residents’ bins on collection day.
They too want the gold that she collects from local residents’ bins because they know in waste lies deep pockets.
Mrs Tamari Musiwacho (57) keeps the City of Mutare’s waste collection schedule besides her bed as if she is employed by the local authority.
She uses the schedule to plan her own times of doing business as she scavenges through people’s bins every morning, hunting for anything plastic or glass.
Her income is in such materials.
“I scavenge people’s bins every week day and during the weekends, I will be sorting out the plastic and glass bottles that I would have collected over the week.
“On Tuesday, the refuse collection guys will be in Yeovil; on Wednesday, they will be in Chikanga Phase 1; on Thursday they will be in the other part of Chikanga Phase 1 and on Friday they will be in Chikanga Phase 2. I will be ahead of them on all these days as they also want this kind of waste.
“You will be surprised at how we fight with these guys over refuse. At times I try to be at least an hour or two hours ahead of their refuse collection truck. At times when they catch up with me, they order me to return the waste as they also want to sell it. Refuse is gold to me, my family is what it is because of that waste,” said Mrs Musiwacho.
She said she sells the plastics at 10 cents per kilogramme to middle men who will then take it to Harare for resale at a higher price.
“All along we have been selling our collection to middlemen who would sell it in Harare at a profit. However, I have been considering travelling on my own to Harare to sell my wares there because of the good prices there,” she said.
The plastics sell for at least 60 cents a kilogramme in Harare.
Mrs Musiwacho, however, said she is facing transport challenges to take her wares to Harare.
“I usually end up selling them here to middlemen here in Mutare because I cannot afford the transport costs to travel to Harare. A 90kg bag costs at least US$10 to transport to Harare, of which I will have at least a tonne to transport. I cannot afford this as my family survives from hand to mouth,” she said.
Mrs Musiwacho has managed to send her four children to school using the income she gets from ransacking people’s bins.
Her husband is unemployed, but has shunned this line of business.
“My husband is unemployed but has never assisted me in this line of business. He would rather sleep at home and wait for the income that I bring in. However I do not blame him, recycling plastics and bottles collected from people’s bins is not child’s play. In fact, my husband takes care of the children while I fend for the family through recycling garbage,” said the woman.
Her children are also stigmatised at school due to their mother’s job, evidenced by how they shied away from the cameras and the news crew.
“Please, do not film me; other learners at my school are not so pleasant when it comes to my mother’s job,” said Mrs Musiwacho’s 16-year-old daughter whose school fees is being paid from the proceeds of the recycling business.
“Honestly, it has not been easy for my children. I do understand them. Other school children or even adults laugh at them because of my line of work. Some neighbours do not associate with my family because of my job, but I do not care. This is where my bread and butter comes from and I will not stop,” said Mrs Musiwacho proudly.
She said she has been labelled as a mentally challenged person by people due to the nature of her job.
The woman collects at least a tonne of waste every month, cleans it and sells it.
She makes roughly US$100 a month from selling the plastic waste in Mutare.
However, if she was to sell in Harare, she would get US$600.
Before venturing into the recycling business, Mrs Musiwacho was a vendor and she would bag roughly US$3 a day, which translated to about US$90 on a good month, hence waste picking is giving slightly better returns.
“If properly managed and of course, if my husband could join me, we could live lavishly and lack nothing in our home,” she said.
Mrs Musiwacho cleans the plastics
Of late, waste picking and recycling of plastics and glass bottles has become the source of income in several households across the province.
While also promoting cleanliness, recycling, what is now termed as the green business, is also supporting youths and women in improving their livelihoods.
A local small to medium enterprise, Tejik Company which specialises in collecting and recycling waste in Mutare, has been supporting youths and women to improve their own livelihoods.
In an interview, Ms Jesca Njukuya of Tejik Company said recycling is their life as it not only helps support youths and women, but it also discourages them from abusing drugs.
“We go around buying waste and sell it afterwards for recycling. We use the money we generate to pay our employees and ourselves. We resorted to be waste pickers because we realised that we will get income while also keeping our country clean. This is better than doing drugs.
“In fact, our employees do not have time for drugs as they are occupied with work at all times,” she said.
Recently, patron for the environment, First Lady, Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa applauded Manicaland for having a good number of community based organisations collecting waste for recycling.
She said this while urging communities in Manicaland to venture into the green businesses and create a green economy by recycling waste and converting it to income generating projects.
Dr Mnangagwa said such businesses are in line with Government’s thrust in the National Development Strategy (NDS1) which underpins recycling initiatives, among other things.
“Recycling is an important pillar for achieving Vision 2030. Let us create treasure from waste and turn waste into wealth through upholding the principles of producing, reusing and recycling our waste,” she said.
Dr Mnangagwa said she has noted that the sector is contributing immensely towards the reduction of waste management challenges in Manicaland and the country at large.
She also challenged every Zimbabwean woman to recycle waste and venture into income generating projects, thereby lessening the dependency syndrome in their homes.
“The time is now for women to champion environmental protection for the benefit of future generations,” said Dr Mnangagwa.
