Recycling: How Barcelona Failed to Implement Garbage Collection – Politics

The accusation of “eco-fascism” has been heard by Barcelona’s left-wing mayor Ada Colau, ever since she had the idea of ​​introducing a waste collection system in the Sant Andreu district with its low houses and quiet alleys: recycled paper and organic waste on Mondays, organic waste and packaging on Wednesdays, residual waste on Thursdays Organic waste and packaging again on Saturdays. With a table and colored dots, they wanted to make it easy for the people in Sant Andreu to remember which garbage bag they should put in front of the door on which evening. The attempt failed.

This system is “fanatic”, according to the neighborhood association Sant Andreu Nord. The mood is no better in the south of the district. “Just imagine: there are garbage bags everywhere, how disgusting it looks, and then the rats,” says a woman who works in the health food store. She is very much in favor of recycling, but not like that.

“Porta a porta” is the name of the system in Catalan, from door to door. Sant Andreu was a pilot project, in four years rubbish is to be separated and collected across Barcelona. This system is fundamentally different from the way most Spaniards have so far separated their garbage: They bring it to the container on the street corner. Whereby the separation does not work ideally. There is residual waste, waste paper, packaging and organic waste, but all too often everything is mixed up inside. According to the Catalan waste agency, around 14 percent of so-called incorrectly thrown items are found in organic waste, and even a quarter in packaging.

This is a problem for Barcelona, ​​because the EU has set a recycling rate of 55 percent by 2025. Barcelona only manages 38 percent. Studies suggest that the street containers invite you not to be too strict about separating rubbish. In other municipalities, the introduction of a garbage disposal system has already made reluctant objectors separate. Especially when the residual waste is only picked up once a week. This increases the incentive not to stuff everything in this sack.

In Barcelona, ​​people seem immune to such attempts at raising children. In the streets of Sant Andreu, yellow bags with packaging piled up on those days when the residual waste was due, and organic waste unfolded its odor next to the house entrance from residual waste Thursday to organic waste Saturday. The garbage collectors put the “Not picked up” sticker on the bags left lying around, which only communicated the obvious. Particularly nasty: As part of the new system, Barcelona has equipped its garbage bags with QR codes, with which each bag can be assigned to its owner. Actually, those who separate well should be credited with a discount on the garbage fee, according to the city. But it doesn’t get that far.

Signatures were collected, neighbors were mobilized, banners were hung up to end these unworthy conditions. With success. Instead of initiating phase two of “Porta a porta” at the end of October, the city administration quickly had the old containers put back up in the streets. Ada Colau promises citizens’ dialogue and a postponement of the next phase. A new date has not been set.

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