Questions/Answers

In Thailand, the solid waste problem is considered as an important environmental problem,caused by have excessive consumption behaviors of human.As they lack the knowledge of waste management such waste sorting and reuse, the volume of waste gradually increasing and acculmulating more than 10 million tons. In fact,Thais produce an average of 1.14 kg of waste per person per day. (Pollution Control Department, 2018) Although, Thailand has a long-term waste management solution,it still cannot solve the problem at Taluk Moo Village where each household produces an average of 144.6 kg of waste /month/household.The types of the waste usually include plastic bags, foams, used agricultural chemical containers, batteries, technology equipments. The problem was raised and analyzed in the village meeting, and It was found that garbage and waste were inappropriately dumped in public area of the community causing disorders and unpleasure odors.The main cause is due to a lacking of waste sorting awareness,and inability to reuse and process the waste that is still valuable; for example, plastic waste, organic waste,especially food waste from households.Therefore, the purpose of the project is to turn the area into a community with a capability to manage waste and reuse it properly, including establishing waste fund and with the cooperation of the public sector,private setor and civil society which people in the area can earn money from the waste. It would provide people the opportunity to contemplate,make decisions,take action,and evaluate the implementation.This further aims to do source separation, reuse the waste, develop the waste fund, and reduce the negative impact on the environment. This results would make a sustainable solution of the solid waste management in the community.

The innovation is consistent with the Category 2: Promoting integrated mechanisms for sustainable development, by starting from the community policy and cooperating with every sector such as the public sectors, and the private sectors.They have the concept on source separation of the waste and waste management, allowing people to participate in perceiving to raise their awareness, take action,sort the waste properly,learning how to make use of the waste is under the concept by sorting the waste that can be sold and transformed into appliances and accessories from which the people in the community can make money.

This project aligns with the 2030 sustainable development agenda according to Goal 11: sustainable city and community (11.6), and Goal 17: partnerships for sustainable development goal,(17.17). In 2016,Taluk Moo Village used to have an average waste of 144.6kg/ month/household. After the implementation,in 2019,it was found that each household could reduce an average waste to 17.2 kg/month/household. 100 percent of the waste can be reused efficiently and managed properly without impacting the environment in the community. This innovation was derived from the cooperation of every sector from people's participation which makes the project transparent. The officials support the operation in the area in order to understand the problem and solve the problem together with the people in the community. The people in the community can create their own rules and regulations and the rules used in the community can be elevated into a provincial policy, the waste can be reused efficiently and managed properly without impacting the environment in the community.

This project is initiated at a local level along with the important goals to reduce the household waste in order to solve the cause of waste problem and promote the sustainable development by establishing the waste fund and making money from it in the community in a way of good governance with all sectors as set the goal together, act together, create community rules and regulations, do a working plan aligning with the concept of community problem,reflect on results for continuous evaluation. People can put the waste into good use and generate income for the community.

This project is an innovation that can reduce the problem of Silo Mentality(silo),through a good governance strategy based on the cooperation of local community and the participation of all sectors in the area. Besides, it provides people opportunities to have the mutual goal to solve a problem according to their own rules, plans and evaluation together. Each section will understand and perform their duties accordingly. This project shall raise people's awareness on reducing the waste that is the main cause of the problems and develop the community into a waste-zero community which will later be a role model and policy in the provincial level highlighting the effective waste management.

This implementation covers the area of Taluk Moo Village thoroughly. The project is open to opinions and suggestions from the all peple regardless of age and gender to create good environment in the community together. It is a mechanism with no specific limitations. The overall operation is to enhance knowledge and understanding and to raise awareness of community participation.

The target group is all villagers in Taluk Moo Village because the involved in the waste problem. Therefore, an important working mechanism is to create understanding for everyone in the community. The overall result showed that Taluk Moo Village has an average amount of waste reducing from 144.6 kilograms/month/household to only 17.2 kilograms/month/household. The community is able to utilize 100% of the waste and manage it appropriately, making Taluk Moo Village a zero-waste village because it can manage the waste properly until there is no more waste left. As a result, Nong Klang Dong Subdistrict Administration Organization was able to minimize the workload of community waste management. The waste fund was also established by the waste community bank in the village. In addition, the waste is sold and processed into appliances and accessories for sale.This can generate income for the community. The average income from garbage is 300-500 baht/month/household. As a result, people in the community are satisfied with the implementation up to 98 %.

The project has two phases: Phase I (2016-2017): The community was experiencing the overflow of the waste and garbage as can be seen from the great amount of waste discarded from each household. The village leaders were aware of the problem and encouraged people to separate the waste by themselves. Therefore, the separation project to reduce global warming, allowing people to sort waste to a certain extent, was introduced. The use of cloth bags in the market to reduce the use of plastic bags was promoted. This helps the community reduce the waste of the village. The strengths that make the Project in its initial stages successful were the community leaders and village leaders. The project had all community members participate in the implementations with the support from Nong Klang Dong Subdistrict Administration Organization(SAO) and associated organizations that took part in the implementation, such as health promoting hospital, community development, village health volunteers and the private sections who are the customers buying the waste. Although the implementation in the first phase could reduce the waste in the village, the burden of remaining waste management still belonged to Nong Klang Dong SAO as they needed to procure bins and waste collection. Phase II (2018-2019) is developed from Phase I to (improve) by adjusting the implementation model.The 7 activities were conducted as follows: (1) Appointing a working group as a waste management village council. (2) The working group organized the village community meeting. (3) Developing knowledge in waste separation and raising awareness of the community to protect the environment. (4) Executing waste separation practice in household/community. (5) Establishing the Waste Fund. (6) Creating a waste management village model (7) Knowledge exchanging platform with a summary of the outcome from the implementation.

The obstacles,Initially, the waste management system encouraged the dumping of trash into the bins Then, SAO of Nong Klang Dong managed this waste. Even though the amount of waste has decreased, there were still some waste that could not be thrown out as usual because some people lacked awareness,and thought that the waste management as a burden of SAO. So the problem solution in the phase II was to adjust the way of thinking about waste management and awareness of people in the community, and focused on designing every activity that allowed all sectors to get involved.

This innovation is the form of developing integrated policy mechanisms from the local level for sustainable development. By initiating efforts to solve community problems with local people. Focus on the cooperation of all sectors to join the process with targeted implementation. The methods are consistent with the community context. There is ongoing monitoring, evaluation and improvement of the process continually. This implementation resulted in being elevated to the formulation of provincial policies. The community was regarded as a role model village which could transfer the implementation methods to other villages in the province and throughout Thailand.

This innovation stems from the concept of Sufficiency Economy Philosophy, understanding, connecting and developing that focuses on civil society. It is a solution to the problems of people who experience problems by themselves, emphasizing participation by applying outcome mapping concepts in the design so that innovation is appropriate for the context of the area. This leads to sustainable solutions. It helps to reduce the problem of waste, estimation and above all, the operation with the said process. It is a change of paradigm (mindset) in the work of civil servants and citizens as well.

This model of Taluk Moo Village was brought to transfer knowledge regarding the implementation model to other villages both in Uthai Thani Province, and more than 30 provinces in Thailand and Taluk Moo Village was the place for observing and learning how to manage the waste as well. There is also the transfer of knowledge in the form of academic works. For example, the presentation at the academic conference of the Ministry of Public Health in 2019. In addition, the implementation model is also applied to work on other issues, such as the operation of promoting safe vegetable consumption in the community, taking on solving actions to solve road accident problems.

This innovation has the potential to pass on knowledge and apply it to other areas. Because the operation design is not complicated and in line with the problems of the area. Besides the community leaders, village leaders and strong local region are strong, having measurement and having clear result. There are also information gathering, learning lessons and reflecting both positively and negatively for complete learning. According to the reasons above, it makes the innovation have the potential of both the innovation model and the people who could transfer knowledge and apply it in other contexts and policies.

Resources for personnel implementation are community leaders, village leaders, teachers, public health personnel, village health volunteers, Subdistrict Administrative Organization officers, social development officers and academic officers joining to be leaders in supporting various bodies of knowledge. The private sectors are waste shops. As for budget resources, they are from Subdistrict Administrative Organization, Thai Health Promotion Foundation and the community waste fund. This implementation reduces the burden of public sectors in provision of bins and waste collection. Because they can utilize all wastes, it will be good results in the long term and reduce the burden of government expenses.

Factors that affect sustainable development are setting common goals for people in the community, principles of action arising from the solving of the cause of the problem, having enough resources, strength community leaders, mainstays and people give their participations, having the continuous reflection of both positive and negative information in order to improve the implementation, a clear measurement and effective management.

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This innovation has both internal and external evaluations. Internal evaluation is an evaluation from community leaders in the village together with Nong Klang Dong Subdistrict Administration Organization. For the external evaluation are the evaluation from Thap Than District Public Health Office together with Thap Than District and Uthai Thani Provincial Health Office.

Indicators and Tools of the Evaluation: 1. The amount of waste that is reduced. The evaluating tools are record forms and scales. By weighing in kilograms and leaders are responsible for weighing wastes. Record according to the form specified. 2. Income from selling and utilising of wastes. The evaluating tools are record forms. 3. Percentage of public satisfaction. The evaluating tools are implementational satisfaction evaluating forms. 4. The number of the increasing collaborative networks. The evaluating tools are the network number record. 5. The percentage of strength of members participating in the implementation is evaluated from the participation evaluating Form.

Evaluation: 1. Taluk Moo Village, before the innovation began in 2016, the average amount of waste is approximately 144.6 kilograms/month/household. After implementing in the year 2019, it was found that each household had an average waste reduced to just 17.2 kilograms/month /household. All the waste can be utilised and managed appropriately 100%. 2. Income from waste management and utilization of waste is estimate 300-500 baht/household /month. 3. 98% of the people are satisfied with the implementation. 4. There are an increase of 7 cooperative networks, which are housewife networks, the Elderly Club, village health volunteers, community vocational group, monks, development community and youth group. 5. 100% of members have strong participation. In addition, there were also waste fund, the waste community bank in the village and 15 model houses for waste management. The role model village for organic waste management is food waste which used to feeding earthworms in 5 household. And use the earthworm manure as organic fertilizer to grow vegetables in order to promote the consumption of chemical-free vegetables in the community and to reduce household expenses for food purchases.

This implementation focuses on creating working partnerships in public services between government agencies and other stakeholders such as civil society, education sector, to develop government services including concrete implementation. There are 2 agencies involved in each sector, as follows: 1. Policy support agencies such as Uthai Thani Provincial Office, Uthai Thani Provincial Administration Organization, Uthai Thani Provincial Health Office and Thap Than District. 2. Operating agencies such as Nong Klang Dong Administration Organization, Taluk Moo Village and waste shops. The participation of the government, the public and the private sector, in which all departments are linked mechanisms according to their roles and responsibilities, makes it have clear and concrete results which demonstrates sustainability

The design of the waste problem solving model comes from a joint meeting to create and discuss the problems that occur in the area. And the joint determination of the common goals of all regions, joint planning and participate in government evaluation. This condition will increase the chances of good decision. Stakeholders understand common goals. And reduce the risk of opposing the implementation of policy decisions or public issues. In other words, stakeholders are more likely to have shared responsibility for the decisions they make and are aware of co-ownership in driving support of the decision to practise instead of hindering. It also focuses on acceptance diversity and the pursuit of equity and equality. The participating of government agencies are Department of Local Administration, Uthai Thani Provincial Office, Uthai Thani Provincial Health Office and Thap Than District. And the private sectors are waste shops,The community leaders and village leaders of Taluk Moo who are an important core, together with academicians, local wisdoms, clubs and the private sector. The main goal of waste management from the origin is to reduce the negative impact on the environment of the community, through participation mechanism in every sector for sustainable development.

The important lesson, "Participatory source separation waste management", is a solution for the root cause of problem which can bring good results. Setting common goals of the community by applying outcome mapping to their implementations, resulting in this innovation is clear in implementational design and clearly measurable. Forming policies from the area is a policy that can be achieved concrete implementation, reduce problems related to modular implementations and strengthen the regulatory system and public administration. It is an initiative of participation from all sectors at the area level and allowing people to participate in the design and policy setting. There is a huge success to be seen as an example of the further development of this innovation, thus it will expand implementations to cover subdistricts, districts and Uthai Thani Province. Moreover, it can be adopted methods and model of action to solve other community problems, such as implementation of promoting safe vegetable consumption in communities and actions to solve road accident problem.