Shimla: Faced with crowding and degradation of urban civic services, the Himachal Pradesh government has shown interest for adopting the Dutch model for garbage disposal, city development, sewerage, transport management and other services.
At a Mutual Cooperation Conference held here today between the Netherland and Himachal government, urban development, country and town planning minister Sudhir Sharma expressed interest in technical knowhow for solid waste management, sewerage, transport management, saving energy and capacity building in urban local bodies.
The Minister said that Netherlands had advanced in different sectors of urban development and there was a vast scope for the replication of advanced technologies and management practices in the State.
“The State government has already sent a proposal to the Union Government for including two Himachal cities under the City Sanitation Plan to be funded by Netherlands,” he said.
With the states urban development department keen to adopt the Dutch garbage disposal systems, Ambassador Alphonsus Stoelinga, who was accompanied by a business delegation of different Netherland companies said, “a feasibility study would offer pragmatic key insights into the intrinsic value of waste as a resource and allow the local authorities to come up with a strategic business model to manage this waste.”
Sharma added that waste management consortia from Netherlands would conduct cost feasibility studies related to waste, water and energy management. They would also prepare city development plans for all district headquarters barring Kinnaur and Lahaul-Spiti. One town in the state would be developed as energy efficient model town.
Earlier, Ambassador Alphonsus Stoelinga and the Dutch business delegation called upon chief minister Virbhadra Singh and discussed the feasibility about cooperation ove water, waste and energy management in Himachal Pradesh.
The chief minister recommended them to formulate a plan wherein cluster of small townships in the suburbs of Shimla town could be incorporated in a single cluster for Solid Waste Management.
