GM Sugar Factory, a sugar manufacturer located in Njeru Municipality, Buikwe District continues to expand the industrial disasters causing significant social, economic, health, and environmental damages to the communities of the Buikwe district.
For years now, GM Sugar Uganda Limited has been in the limelight for discharging raw effluent into wetlands and Lake Victoria causing damage to water sources and fish bleeding areas.
Last year, the Environmental Protection Police Unit (EPPU), an enforcement agency created to support the Ministry of Water and Environment (MoWE) in enforcing environmental laws and regulations arrested three Indian Nationals attached to GM Sugar Uganda Limited for alleged environmental degradation and air pollution but the situation has remained the same.
Since establishing the factory, residents in the Buikwe district have been protesting the emissions and waste from the GM sugar factory. However, their efforts have failed to attract an everlasting solution.
The factory allegedly discharges bagasse, a dry pulpy waste from the extraction of juice from sugar cane into the environment.
Over seasons, residents claim their crops have weathered because of bagasse, which also contaminates water. Their pleas to the district authorities to restrain the factory from discharging the waste remain meaningless.
Wastewater discharge contains several harmful substances or chemicals, which may cause adverse environmental impacts such as changes in aquatic habitats, species composition, and decrease in biodiversity.
Studies show that Waste disposal sites (WDS) pose serious threats to the health, quality, and resilience of all ecosystems and human health.
Industrial wastes have adverse effects on water quality. High levels of pollutants in water bodies and protected areas cause an increase in biological oxygen demand (BOD), chemical oxygen demand (COD), total dissolved solids (TDS), and total suspended solids (TSS).
Industries are generating volumetric wastes which are discharged without treatment into nearby water bodies, potentially degrading their water quality.
The factory reportedly uses outdated manufacturing technologies and does not have efficient seepage treatment plants. Therefore, raw and harmful wastes are discharged into the surrounding water bodies.
In Uganda, it is estimated that over 30,000 people die annually due to air pollution-related illnesses while ambient air quality levels in monitored urban centres are estimated at over 5 times the WHO annual guidelines.
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