SUSWAM at European Cooperation Day

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European Cooperation Day

European Cooperation Day  took place on September 18, 2020. The conference was organized in both live and online format. The territory of the Kostomuksha urban district was represented by 10 projects of the Karelia cross-border cooperation program. More than 30 people took part in the event live and about 40 people connected online.

The participants showed a keen interest in the projects taking place on our territory.

SUSWAM project “Sustainable waste management in the Republic of Karelia and the Kainuu region” provoked most discussion, which was completely unexpected for everyone. Anna Belenikhina, representative of the lead partner KAMK, gave a general overview of the project and indicated the problematic points on both sides of the border in the waste management field.

Anatoly Evgenievich Mikhailov, General Director of MSA LLC and project partner, provided information on the progress of the project in the territory of the Kostomuksha urban district. What tasks are being solved by MSA LLC at the moment? Solid municipal waste is a long-standing problem in all cities and towns. A clearer approach towards waste management has only been established in recent years. Anatoly Evgenievich said that landfill operated by MSA could not accept all waste. For example, a container for broken glass was filled on the very first day after its placement. But there is no further glass recycling. There is a problem of where to take glass and who will recycle it. The second problem is sorting and storing waste in the apartments. There were many examples from Petrozavodsk, where people throw away garbage to the installed containers. Kostomuksha decided not to follow this example. Therefore, in our city there are no rats and heap of garbage containers. Waste collection is scheduled for every house where a waste transport car arrives daily and collects waste. Currently, waste is already sorted by residents themselves and then also at the landfill. The discussion highlighted how little information on waste sorting is provided to the population. Waste education shall start in kindergarten and school. In Kostomuksha, a very broad environmental education is carried out in schools and kindergartens. The Kostomukshsky Nature Reserve has dedicated a whole department in its Visit Center to the environmental education. Throughout the year, residents and guests of the city, children and school groups join excursions to the reserve, where they are introduced to an entertaining story about waste, participate in various quests, and learn a lot about what “garbage” is.

The SUSWAM project plans to take an active part in the Night of the Arts event in Kostomuksha in November 2020. How is waste related to art? At a round table we will discuss how to manage waste, we will listen to a jazz orchestra playing the instruments made from "waste materials", visit a museum of amazing musical instruments and make something ourselves. It will be interesting.

 

Project manager Galina Potapova, Administration of Kostomuksha