BENIN CITY: The Governor of Edo State Mr. Godwin Obaseki said he will be unveiling the environmental strategy of his administration and lunching a major environmental campaign to make Edo State and Benin City the cleanness capital in this country as his administration is ready to partner with investors who are willing and interested in converting waste to wealth.
Governor Obaseki made the disclosure yesterday when he received the management team of Benson Idahosa University who paid him a courtesy visit in government house in Benin City.
He said waste disposal is an issue for his administration and stressed the need to articulate properly to achieve the goal of his administration in terms of keeping the state clean as this has prompted his visit to the dump site and proposed dump site in the state.
“Within the next few months we are going to unveil our environmental strategy for the state and we are going to be lunching major environmental campaign because it is our goal to make Edo State and Benin City the cleanness in the country. It will involve massive citizens’ participation”.
Speaking on behalf of the delegation the Vice-Chancellor of Benson Idahosa University (BIU) Prof. Ernest Izevbigie said the institution is in government house to inform the governor that they want to partner with the state government in the area of waste management turning waste to wealth that will benefit the state and equally develop it.
“We want to partner with you in the area of waste management as we already have partner waiting to collaborate with us in this projects”.
He said if the state government agrees to partner with his Institution it will cause them nothing as their partner is ready to fund the whole project. “If we have your support, the company will be mobilized and it will begin to build the waste recycle facility with bio-reactor. The bio-reactor will serves as artificial stomach to digest all the carbon based materials. Edo people will be hired for the construction phase. After this stage, we need raw materials which are the waste. Employment will come in because people will be hire and paid to sort out the waste. The transportation of these materials is another phase of employment for Edo youths, those employed will transport the material to the facility and people will equally be employed to run this facility”.
According to him, people see waste but we see opportunity. We can convert that waste into wealth for the state thereby generating employment to fit into the vision of this present administration. The project can generate income for the state by creating jobs; cleaning the environment; bringing innovation to Edo State; reducing health problems and equally having the opportunity through the waste to generate electricity that will further bring economy development to the state.
