The state of waste management in the north of Montenegro is unacceptable, announced today from Coalition 27, an informal network of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) formed to monitor and promote the transposition and implementation of European legal acquis in the field of environment and climate change.
"Even after 16 years since the establishment of the strategic and legal framework for regionalization in the field of waste management, Montenegro has not managed to establish such a model in the north of the country, and it has not been adequately resolved in the other regions either," states the announcement of Coalition 27, which was submitted by the NGO "Severna zemlja", a member of the coalition.
The coalition said that most of the European legislation has been transposed, but when it comes to the implementation of the principles of the European hierarchy of waste management, it is still at the beginning.
"This is what the reports on progress, which the European Commission (EC) brings every year, point out. Problems in this area were also pointed out by our Coalition 27, both in this year's and in the previous shadow reports that it produced. In the last Shadow Report , we emphasize that the main challenges in Montenegro, in the field of waste management, are: the establishment of an adequate infrastructure that would enable a system of waste selection and recycling, rehabilitation of numerous landfills throughout Montenegro, solving the issue of industrial waste and the establishment of effective inspection supervision. sustainable system of inspection, as well as the indiscriminate application of penal policy are the biggest challenges", stated in the statement of the Coalition on the 27th.
They added that they are particularly concerned by the fact that even after 16 years, there is no solution for adequate waste management in the north of Montenegro, bearing in mind that the location for the future regional center for waste management in Bijelo Polje, at the Čelinska kosa location, has only recently been determined. , which is located near the border with the municipality of Mojkovac.
"It is questionable whether it will remain as the final choice, bearing in mind the fact that the villagers who gravitate to that location are protesting. The fact that disposal in unsanitary landfills is still possible indicates that such a method of waste management not only directly threatens the quality of life the environment, but to the extent that cheap unregulated disposal is allowed, it economically undermines other waste management options," said Coalition 27.
They state that Montenegro started its waste management policy in 2004 with the adoption of the National Waste Management Policy.
"Then, the following year, the Strategic Master Plan for Waste Management and the Law on Waste Management were adopted. As it was estimated that the preconditions for the implementation of the Law were not created, its application was first postponed to 2008, and then to 2010. The problem with the implementation of that The Law was present even after that, and the obligation to further harmonize it with European legislation was generated by the very dynamics of its development, and for these reasons there was a need to draft a new Law, which was adopted in 2011. In the mentioned period, the State waste management plan for the period 2008 - 2012, as a strategic document that regulates the area of waste management in Montenegro. need to implement, solved numerous problems that Montenegro was facing in those years, as stated in numerous reports of the European Commission (EC) and other relevant institutions and organizations in that period. Since the period for which the previous set of strategic documents was prepared has expired, and it was necessary to prepare and adopt a new group of documents, there was a need to review previously planned and achieved goals in the field of waste management, as well as to review all existing problems, the needs and possibilities of Montenegro when it comes to this area. For this reason, at the end of 2013, the state began to amend the existing and draft new documents in this area," said the 27th Coalition.
They also stated that in 2015, the State Plan for Waste Management 2015-2020 was adopted, and a little later, the new, amended Law on Waste Management (2016) was adopted.
"During that ten-year period, two regional sanitary landfills were built, in Podgorica and Bar, where municipal waste from the central and southern regions was disposed of, and is still disposed of today. This only partially solved the issue of waste management in Montenegro, leaving the northern region still left to the natural policy of disposing of waste in unsanitary landfills, most often next to watercourses. Due to the large share of organic components in solid municipal waste, landfills were and remain large sources of greenhouse gas emissions (methane). In the absence of other measures, the low level of disposal costs at these landfills, which is most likely the reason for local governments to use them, does not provide an incentive to improve waste management in accordance with the waste management hierarchy. reimbursement of costs," reads the statement of the Coalition on the 27th.
They emphasize that many issues related to special waste streams, hazardous waste, and recycling remained unresolved during that period.
"Therefore, Coalition 27 requires all competent authorities to accelerate the resolution of waste management issues in the north of Montenegro, guided by the fact that we, as a candidate country for the European Union, at a time when negotiations for Chapter 27 are already widely open, cannot allow ourselves to In half of our territory, waste is disposed of contrary to all ecological and sustainable development principles, in general," concludes the statement of the Coalition on the 27th.
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