Sustainable Waste Management in Schools

Pakistan produces 0.283 to 0.612 kg of solid waste per capita in a day, and 49.6 million tons in a year, which increases by 2.4% annually. This can be attributed amongst other factors to a lack of public awareness and inadequate official waste management systems. There is a lack of focused education and training in childhood and adolescence to shape behaviors to promote cleanliness in the society.

As agents of change, the hub aims to change the mindsets of young students in the hopes that this project can ultimately be replicated on a larger scale and thus help create a network of change agents who are thinking more responsibly about the world they live in. By making disposing of trash an enjoyable experience as opposed to a boring chore forced upon them, the hub hopes to change students’ mindsets toward cleaning up, binning in particular. Inspiration came from the Ballot Bin project introduced by Hubbub, Westminster Council, and Instrument PD in the UK. The Ballot Bin reduced cigarette litter on busy streets by 74%.

The project will observe littering trends on campus before, during, and after the duration of the project. The hub hopes to see an improvement in students' understanding of littering while also seeing a marked decrease in their littering habits. The team also aims to make this a topic they actively take interest in, by forming linkages between existing environmental problems they face (smog, etc.) and littering. 

The goal of the project is to:

• Train 100-150 young females on Sustainable Waste Management practices.


• Collect single-use plastic bottles and use them to create low-cost garbage bins for deployment across the university campus.