NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Friday, April 12, 2013

Just one-third of Nairobi’s trash makes it to the single municipal dumpsite at Dandora. The rest – the solid waste of nearly 2.5 million residents, remains unaccounted for. One social enterprise has developed an innovative waste-management model – to encourage the recycling and composting of Nairobi’s trash.

In the Kangemi suburb of Nairobi, residents carefully avoid the piles of trash that have become permanent features of the city’s landscape. One social enterprise, Takataka Solutions, aims to change the terrain. Takataka, which means trash in Kiswahili, offers affordable waste collection services to Kangemi residents.

Daniel Paffenholz founded the company in 2011. “Legally speaking, in Nairobi the city council is supposed to provide waste management services for all residents. That is about 3.5 million people. Effectively the city has 8 trucks,” he explained.