A Ramco trash collection vehicle. (Credit: NNA)
BEIRUT — Waste management company Ramco said it had suspended trash collection services in the areas of Metn and Kesrouan on Tuesday due to the encroachment of dozens of scavengers at the Burj Hammoud-Jdeideh landfill and an absence of security forces to control the situation.
Here’s what we know:
• Ramco director Walid Bou Saad told L’Orient Today that the number of scavengers had been increasing at the landfill in recent days, due to the absence of security forces, which had stopped patrolling the landfill a week ago.
• “The scavengers have been aggressive with our employees and are stealing equipment, and we have had to stop services not because we want to, but because it is a threat to the safety of the workers,” Bou Saad said.
• It is unclear why security forces had apparently withdrawn from the site. The Internal Security Forces could not be reached for immediate comment.
• According to Bou Saad, the scavengers have been stealing scrap metal to resell it, as well as equipment belonging to Khoury Contracting Company, which oversees the Burj Hammoud-Jdeideh site.
• Scavenging has increased as Lebanon faces its most severe economic downturn in decades; more than half of Lebanese people are estimated to now live in poverty. The state offers no widely accessible social safety net.
• Bou Saad said resumption of trash collection would depend on security forces regaining control of the situation at the landfill.
• Garbage collection was temporarily halted in June for reportedly the same reasons, with waste piling up for days in Metn and Kesrouan.
• Lebanon has been plagued by decades of waste management failures as politicians proved chronically incapable of finding long-term solutions.