Community organizations can also play a vital role in managing the waste in their localities. This success story is about a community organization in Badowita area that has been implementing a successful source separation programme since 2001. They have been able to achieve the support of 90% of residents in the area and handle 1.5 to 2 tons of recyclables from 1600 households per month in an environmental friendly and profitable way.

Badowita is a densely populated area under the jurisdiction of Dehiwala Mount Lavinia municipal council. The residents originally lived along canal banks in Kilulapona, Wellawatta Redimola Watta and Wawul Bogaha areas. In before early nineties they moved to Badowita under a relocation programme carried out by the Law Land Development Board and the Housing Development Authority in a bid to control floods.

Restarting life in the new locality was a challenge. They had to face various problems in getting their necessities fulfilled. To make a voice for their issues people got together to form community development organizations. There are six such community organizations that have got together to form the Badowita United Community Development Society.  Through this, they have found solutions for most of the problems they faced and solid waste management is one such area, the society had a roaring success.

There were heaps of waste along roads and community dumping sites before project initiation. Upon request of the united society to Dehiwala Mount Lavinia MC, Urban Development Authority, JAICA and Sevanatha has helped the community to start this novel kind of source separation programme.

The community organization has deployed two handcarts to collect recyclable materials. Households have been made aware to separate their waste as biodegradables and non-biodegradables. The carts visit the houses once a fortnight to collect the biodegradables collected by households. To make the collection more organized and efficient there is a collection schedule of which the residents are well informed. The takes a balance with him and measures each type of recyclable in the collection materials as paper, plastic, polythene, metal, and glass etc., and marks them in a sheet in front of the owner. For each kind of marketable recyclable item the household gets some money according to the weight. Unit price paid for recyclable items  is lesser than that of true market price by one or two rupees. At the end of the month they calculate the total weight of each kind of recyclable and pay about 15-20 rupees per house. Some households use this money for separate purposes like paying their water bill etc.

Collected recyclables are then transfered to the ell-built collection center located in the vicinity of the housing scheme. The land, which originally belonged to the Law Land Development Board, has been handed over to the Municipal council upon request of the community organization. The MC has built the premises for the recycling center and has rented out to the community organization. Some ladies from neighbourhood further separate collected recyclable items according to market requirements. When considerable amounts of recyclables gets collected buyers are contacted and sold out. Money earned from recyclables is credited to a joint account handled by the health Administrative Officer-Badowita of MC and the treasure of the community organization.  Money required for buying recyclables from the community is released from the account via checks upon written request of the treasurer.

Mr. Upananda Karunasiri alias Anura is the caretaker of the recyclable centre keeps records of recyclable buying and selling for transparency.  Before being assigned to this position, he was a community activist and the secretary of a community organization. Knowledge he could gather on waste separation and bailing of recyclables on visits to recycling industries was of much use in project initiation. He pioneered and volunteered to carry out the source separation programme for one year. After a year of free work, he requested some organization to pay for his service, as it was difficult for him to keep home fires burning. As a result, he was recruited to the municipal council.  Now, salaries of other workers, recyclable separating ladies and the collectors are also borne by the municipal council.  The profit from this programme is used back on community welfare activities when need arises.  The community organization has donated chairs to the funeral assistance committee, sponsored repairing sewage lines and has done much other immediate response work.