In Panama’s Carti Islands, we’ve been working with the indigenous Kuna people to establish an effective waste management system for their densely-populated island communities. We provided equipment like plastic bottle crushers and scales and they drafted regulations for collecting and exporting their trash and recycling to the mainland. Our field representative in Panama reports that the new regulations have already brought big changes:

The response has been swift. Garbage collection is increasingly becoming commonplace in each beneficiary island. They have designated “clean points” where project-donated garbage baskets are placed. Kuna women organized in committees (known as Bundur Gan Kalu) have taken a lead in cleaning their communities´ narrow corridors between rows of houses. Periodically this garbage is loaded into boats by appointed garbage collectors who take it to a newly designated landfill area. Collection and sale of aluminum cans is also a new business: school science groups and local dwellers can be seen collecting, crushing, bagging them and taking them to the buyers who stop by the islands.

Read more about our project in Panama’s Carti Islands.