Increased rain yields huge collection of recyclables and trash at Hennops

The increased rainfall in Pretoria over the past few weeks has resulted in an increase of waste collection in the so-called ‘poly-island’ litter trap set up by the Hennops Revival NGO.

“The rain makes it a bit harder to now go into the water and do a usual clean-up like we do normally,” said the NGO’s founder Tarryn Johnston.

“But we are keeping ourselves busy on the ground. We are doing ground clean-ups around the river that resulted in the collection of 150 bags of plastic bottles and 180 bags of polystyrene. These are all recyclable.”

The poly-island is a big net that stretches over the river to collect waste and litter from the water as it passes through.

“The rain has increased the water flow, making the poly-island very effective, as it catches a bunch of litter coming downstream. However, we will have to start cleaning it soon, as it is getting very full, very quickly.

“Unfortunately, it’s something that we’ll have to do by hand. We can’t use any machinery as the poly-island is tied to trees next to the river. It’s increasingly harder to empty it on a big scale.”

The poly-island is 3m high and it is so big that a person can even stand on it.

Johnston also told Rekord about the effects the rain has had on the spread of illegal dumping items and the blockage of bridge and storm water drains.

“This year we’ve really tried to avoid certain high risk areas in Centurion from flooding.

“We all know about the risks of bridges in the area, and the spread of litter on the ground, swept up by all the rain water, then flows into these drains or canals. It causes havoc in terms of flooding,” she explained.

“We recently informed the Tshwane metro of 12 blocked canals in the area and they were luckily attended to quickly.

“We are repeatedly told to tackle the problem at the source, but the problem in my opinion, is the lack of dustbins around the city,” she said.

“What do people do with their litter when they walk in the street and want to throw something away? They dump it in the nearest drain or similar. We need to address this. Then we’ll see a difference in litter levels in the river. Street littering, I think, is one of our biggest contributors,” Johnston said.

Johnston said that funding is at the top of the organisation’s list of requirements.

“Cleaning up our polluted areas and rivers is hard work. Most of it has to be done by hand.

“If we have the required funding available, I can expand my teams, employ unemployed workers from surrounding neighbourhoods to tackle this problem once and for all,” she concluded.