Abu Shagara is one of Sharjah’s heavily populated residential areas. With such conditions, issues of garbage disposal and pick up arise and that is exactly what a reader has concerns over.
Gaurang Shah is a resident of Abu Shagara, and he has noticed a particular area with garbage collecting in multiple skips for a while but there are no signs of them being cleaned up.
“Day by day it is getting difficult to breathe in the area due to the waste and its smell,” he said.
Food waste a concern
The large skips are located right in front of a popular supermarket in the area and there are a few restaurants nearby as well. This is making things worse because these businesses are dumping the waste, especially food waste, and it is piling up.
The grocery store and eateries produce large amounts of food waste on the daily, including meat. Such waste, when left in the heat for days, produces an intense odour and adds to the unhygienic circumstances in the residential area.
Shah also said that some residents and individuals from the businesses around the area, are not even bothering to dump the garbage near the skips and instead leave it on the road or next to the pavements.
Increase in stray animals
The food waste has also attracted stray cats to the area and is turning into a breeding ground for rodents.
“I have witnessed a radical increase of cats in this area. We need help with this issue as soon as possible,” he said.
Road hazard
Shah also highlighted that due to the dumpsters overflowing, the trash and bags of garbage people toss, fall onto the road and it has become an obstruction to traffic.
“The garbage seems to be thrown on the main road itself. It is difficult to drive in the designated lanes,” he said.
Ali Hussaini has lived in the area for over 24 years and he has seen Sharjah Municipality as well as Bee’ah pick up trash on a regular basis.
“Every night they [garbage trucks] come and pick up the trash and cleaners also clean the roads,” he said.
The 27-year-old believes it’s the businesses that have caused an issue in the area. “Who throws garbage where cannot always be controlled. It is the supermarkets’ and restaurants’ responsibility to dispose it in the right way,” he said.
It is a fairly recent issue Hussaini added.
Both readers have requested authorities to look into the problem.
“Through Gulf News I am requesting to please take action regarding this issue for the people in Abu Shagara area,” Shah said.
Bee’ah response
Gulf News approached Bee’ah, Sharjah based environment management company regarding the problem.
Fahad Shehail, CEO of Waste Management Services at Bee’ah said: “The bin in question is not part of Bee’ah’s operations but owned by a supermarket in the area that has not contracted collection services with either us or the other six waste collection services in Sharjah and hence the trash has not been taken away. Despite several verbal warnings to empty the bin and to sign a waste collection contract, the party owning the bin hasn’t taken any action.”
Bee’ah’s representative added that the company works closely with the municipality and inspectors are monitoring the situation to ensure parties adhere to the correct process of waste management and collection.
In addition, on October 17, the proper authorities have given official notice to the owners of the bin to make arrangements with a service provider so that the bin may be emptied.
“This is a fairly common issue and we strongly urge all commercial entities to ensure they have subscribed for collection services to avoid overly loaded bins and complaints. This way, we can allocate the proper resources to regularly empty bins, as we do for all our contracted partners, and help keep the city clean,” the representative added.
