By Nangamso Mabindla
27 October 2006

A TEAM from Naledi Municipality, from Vryburg in North West Province, has visited Buffalo City to look at ways the City deals with solid waste management.

During the week-long visit the team, led by Dannie van Tonner, a city councillor, toured Buffalo's various management projects, including the streams clean-up in Duncan Village, the new R50-million regional waste site in Berlin, the City's waste management equipment and trucks, and the waste site in Ducats outside East London.

Speaking about the two municipality's connections, acting Executive Mayor Mankomo Pango said that both had twinning agreements with Netherlands cities - Buffalo City had connections with Leiden and Naledi with Assen.

"It was because of these links that we met officials from Naledi; and we decided to share information on waste management. I believe that despite the fact that it is a smaller municipality, we have similar challenges when it comes to waste management," Pango said.

She was happy that local municipalities were growing intergovernmental relations. "This visit will capacitate both cities because we will be able to learn from each other. With visits like these we look at our shortfalls compared with other cities, and we also look at skills, our potential and at where we need to improve as municipalities."

Danie Ferreira from Naledi Municipality's waste management section said that the visit was an eye-opener. "We were impressed with the regional waste site and when I saw the high standards in this city, I felt that there was a lot we could learn from them. I am looking forward to implementing some of the ideas learned here in our own municipality."

As part of the municipalities' agreement a team from Buffalo City will visit Naledi in November. "Even though we are a smaller municipality, with 500 employees, Buffalo City's delegation will also learn a lot from our waste management section," Ferreira concluded.