Wild landfills have been an ecological problem for decades in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
According to the data of local associations, there are more than a thousand illegal garbage dumps in our country. However, there is progress, he writes BHRT.
Sports fishermen have brought order to the banks of the Bosna River in the municipality of Doboj Jug. In this locality, you can no longer see piles of garbage near the river.
Irfan Hadžić, a fisherman from Doboj, says he is satisfied with the cleanliness.
“There are times when someone doesn’t behave in accordance, to be pure nature and that, but basically you can be satisfied with the cleanliness of this place and the arrangement. It’s properly arranged, great.”
Remains on treetops in the coastal area, however, show that garbage is still thrown in or next to the river.
“There is a saying – whoever throws garbage into the water, will never be lucky,” says Irfan Hadžić.
Zikret from the vicinity of Gračanica, who has been living and working in Slovenia for two decades, which is one of the cleanest countries in Europe, also comes to this place.
“We need a little more investment, more machines, more commitment, municipalities, cities, cantons, more money.”
There is also a shift in concern for the environment downstream.
Wild landfills did not disappear only from this place in the Doboj Jug municipality. There are none on the shores of Bosnia, nor in neighboring Doboj.
Heaps of household garbage, glass bottles or plastic packaging can no longer be seen even near the river in the settlement of Kotosrko near Doboj since organized waste collection began in the settlement a few years ago.
“Now the situation is good, clean. Now there is no garbage thrown, as far as we Kotorans are concerned. It is taken away, trucks come every Wednesday and take it away, there is no garbage near Bosnia,” says Izudin Glavić, ferryman on the Bosna River.
Near the river in Kotorsko, only piles of heavy, construction waste are visible. And while illegal dumps are removed in rural areas, the problem exists in urban areas as well. Municipal workers often have to remove piles of garbage near the former Doboj hospital, which is about a fifteen-minute walk from the city center.
“We get new bags in just two days or so, we drive every ten days. There is always a truck full of garbage, one ten cubic meters here in this place. It is constantly being cleaned, driven, but there is always some,” says Hrvoje Starčević, from KP “Progres”, Doboj.
Two days after the removal, the garbage bags were again in this place. Large waste is also dumped in the populated part of the neighboring municipality of Doboj Jug. Although there are positive examples, wild landfills in the Doboj area, along with hundreds of others throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina, show that waste management is an area where there is still plenty of room for investment and improvement.
