KIPPRA: Circular economy will deal with plastic menace unlike ban

The other is Mr Green Africa, which is one of the recycling companies in the continent that has leveraged mobile-app technology in its collection process by integrating informal waste collectors, consumers, and entrepreneurs into the value chain.

"The shift from the concentration on the ban on single-use of plastics to the transition towards a circular economy is not a smooth one," says KIPPRA.

"The policy and legal environment are supposed to support and give guidelines on how the implementation should be carried out."

KIPPRA says an assessment of the policy and legal environment shows that the available policies do not address the whole value chain of plastics, which includes design, production, use, disposal, collection, segregation and recycling.

"The policies do not give a clear roadmap on how it is supposed to be implemented. In addition, waste management policies seem to be fragmented in these documents, and no specific policy on the circular economy would help in accelerating the transition," says KIPPRA in the policy brief.

A shortcoming in the application of technology in plastic waste management is that it is more mechanical.

"Previous studies show that Kenya is yet to fully embrace technology along the plastic value chain as most technologies are applicable in the collection and recycling stages," says KIPPRA.

"Although there are firms in Kenya using technologies such as mobile-enabled apps, there is still more to be done."

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