To realize what you have at home, sometimes you have to go abroad. He looked further out of the tumult. In October last year, Hernani Mayor Luis Intxauspe was first surprised and then excited when Paul Connet interrupted him by applauding the speech at the Italian Capannori. At the invitation of the Rifiuti Zero, Intxauspe explained how the Puerta a Puerta collection is done in Hernani. When he showed the pendant to deposit the rubble, Connet, the most famous guru of the Zero Waste movement, stood up and said it seemed an extraordinary advance... A system that so many in Gipuzkoa have described as impostor!

Paul Connet informed the mayor of his intention to learn about the efforts being made in Euskal Herria to reduce waste. He will speak on 11 May. One of the major coalitions working towards smarter waste management in Europe and around the world, Zero Waste Europe (ZWE), wants to see with its own eyes the transition of Gipuzkoans towards a Zero Waste strategy from a waste incineration project. On the other hand, between storms and storms, he showed his support to those who work for it. The three-day programme is available on your website: Annual Zero Waste Europe meeting in Bogotá – ▸ th May 2012.

Institutions and militants

ZWE is a coalition of three major organizations. First GAIA, whose acronyms can be read in two ways: Global Anti-Incinerator Alliance and Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives. In other words, they are fighting both for waste incineration and for alternatives to incineration. The representative of GAIA for Europe is also Catalan Joan Marc Simon, coordinator of ZWE.

Ekologistak Martxan is a partner of GAIA. That is why in 2007 the organization held a world assembly in Hondarribia to deal with the incinerator project to be implemented in Txingudi.

Present on all continents of the world, GAIA is doing a great deal of work on climate justice, it could be said that it has been it that has spread in the world what has been called Zero Waste. With different translations and specifications, because the situations are very different in India, the Philippines, Argentina or Catalonia.

In Asia and South America, for example, they have faced multinationals that want to install incinerators in defence of the rights and dignity of urban waste collectors. It is no coincidence that waste incineration has been legally prohibited in Argentina and the Philippines.
Friends of the Earth is the second leg of ZWE, one of the most powerful environmental NGOs. It covers 76 countries of the world, with 5,000 groups, and claims to bring together more than two million members.

The third component is the European Environmental Bureau (BSE). Founded in 1974, it brings together 140 social movements. It offers the European authorities recommendations on environmental issues such as biodiversity, waste, nanotechnologies, chemicals, waste and climate change. It is mainly financed by public subsidies.

Trash, a sign of failure

Robin Murray wrote in his book Zero Waste (Greenpeace, 2002) that waste did not leave the darkness until very soon after the 20th century. The invisible ones did not come into anyone's calculation, the specialized industry sidelined them from the public's view, and it ran out. The first problems arose with landfill sites, which are becoming increasingly evident and which seriously pollute the waters of the surrounding area and, to put it mildly, affect climate change.

Subsequently, although they were sold as miraculous systems for the final disposal of waste in the more developed countries, it was also demonstrated that incineration plants presented serious problems. By burning waste, they lead to even more dangerous toxic substances. In addition, incineration does not solve, but it worsens one of the major problems facing human beings today: the shortage of raw materials.

Zero Waste is a concept that has been increasingly worked on since the 1970s. It is based on the concept of industrial production, in particular the idea of Total Quality Management, which spread from Japan to the whole world. Just as in a production chain, products and processes should not have failures, in the waste it is about bringing them closer to zero. The residue is a defect.

Thus, the initial idea of Zero Discharge (landfill) was completed with Zero Atmospheric Damage (no air pollution), so that soon the awareness of the shortage of raw materials would grow: Zero Material Waste (do not waste any materials).

Throughout the production system

“The large amount of waste generated by our societies shows that our production system is ineffective and we are not in solidarity with future generations,” can be read on the ZWE website. That is why it proposes to redesign society itself to remove any useless waste and to make whatever is produced reusable, repairable, compostable or recyclable in the system. Anything that cannot be repaired, composted or recycled must be redesigned or replaced or banned on the market. “Zero Waste is a set of philosophy, strategies and practical tools for waste disposal, not waste management.”

ZWE calls for cultural change to go beyond politically beautiful recycling. “Over the past few decades Europeans have experienced an increase in ecological debt to the rest of the world, importing four times as much of the materials we export. (...) We must start consuming less raw materials and energy.” To this end, it attaches great importance to social mobilization.

But in addition to citizen participation, ZWE’s intention is for the authorities to make a profound change in infrastructure in three areas. On the one hand, waste prevention. Industry has to shoulder its responsibilities: designing and modifying sustainable products; removing those that are susceptible to composting, reusing or recycling; educating consumers as business professionals...

Secondly, the selective collection of waste must be made more widespread. “Door-to-Door collection is the fastest tool to prevent waste proliferation and to separate items clearly where they have been consumed.” In addition, the institutions must act with the price to penalise the generation of more waste. Local recycling sites should also be promoted.

And thirdly, to complete the scheme, what is today called rejection in Gipuzkoa, we must try to reduce that 10%-20% (in English residual waste) that cannot be recycled, reused or composted. These products and components should be withdrawn from the market if they cannot be modified and redesigned. In the meantime, a biological stabilisation of this scarce residue should be made in order to be able to be deposited in special landfills.

Connet, Ercolini, Favoino...

Paul Connett is one of the artists who will be most excited among the attendees of the ZWE meeting in Gipuzkoa from 11 to 13 May. Professor of Chemistry at Saint Lawrence University in New York, Connett not to speak today in the Philippines, tomorrow in Italy. In 2007 he was in Hondarribia, on the occasion of the construction of the Txingudi incinerator. You'll notice the difference.

Connett has a role in summarizing his idea: Zero Waste: a Key Move towards a Sustainable Society. “Zero Zabor,” Connette says, “says no to incinerators, big landfills, waste society… and yes to sustainable society. It seems idealistic, but we can make it happen. We should not wait to reach zero waste next year, but we can anticipate that some peoples will be very close to it by 2020.”

Paul Conette will speak on Saturday, May 12 at the reception ceremony organized by the City Hall of San Sebastian with the theme “The 10 steps of the municipalities to reach Zero Zabor”. Rossano Ercolini, from the Italian town of Capannori, the engine of the Rifiuti Zero movement, will speak with him. In 2010 he delivered his speech at Hernani, which can be seen on the Internet. He will explain in Donostia what the municipalities that have joined the Rifiuti Zero network have done.

Enzo Favoino will be the third speaker with the title of Best Foreign Language Interpreter. He's one of the top composting experts. He is considered the heir of Marco Ricci, which gave a special impetus to the collection of Puerta a Puerta in Italy from the agricultural school of Monza. The theme of Favoño: Experiences of biological stabilisation of waste rejection.

Usurbil is the heart

Although the Zero Zabor group in Gipuzkoa recognises Zero Waste as a member of Europe, the Donostia group will be the first joint meeting to be held. These days of May will be historic for many politicians and volunteers who have been mercilessly murdered and despised by the media.

For a long time, as today, the People's Living Groups have been brought together by the Anti-Incineration Platform Coordinator. At Hernani, Zero Zabor is the first to take this name in 2009, warming up the alternatives that were taking place in Usurbil. Soon came those of Zumaia, Zarautz, Azpeitia... No doubt the soul and engine of Zero Zabor is the Usurbil team. Most of the material to work from village to village has been created by himself, which has the fastest dynamic, the result of the militancy worked since 2007. Usurbil is the first to pick up Door to Door and one of the pioneers in the Zero Trash strategy. The Oñati group has distinguished itself greatly among the 30 groups that make up the GZZ today; it has recently published the documentary Incineretari Atea Itxi.

The Guipuzkoans – and those who approach the whole of the Basque Country equally – will meet at the San Sebastian Congress with those of other countries participating in Zero Waste Europe, such as Italy, the United Kingdom, Slovakia, Hungary, Catalonia and the Netherlands.

However, representatives of the municipalities who have shown an interest in immersing themselves in the Zero Zabor strategy will be equally important as the volunteers of the groups. For once, the authorities of the municipalities that have decided to collect from Puerta a Puerta will find someone who listens without contempt or prejudice.

Zero Zabor is a municipal network

One of the points that Zero Waste Europe will discuss at the Donostia-San Sebastián Plenary Session is the one that will be of interest to many towns in Gipuzkoa, to be presented by Enzo Favoño, under the title “How to evaluate the municipalities of Zero Zabor? Proposing 4 indicators.” As has been done in Italy and Catalonia, some presidents have expressed their intention to organize the municipal network of Trash Cero, the concretization of the criteria by ZWE will facilitate the way to those who want to take steps from the collection of Puerta a Puerta.

Between 11 and 13 May, many Gipuzkoans will breathe a little: foreign personalities will recognize that they are not fools, but they are modern and intelligent because of the selective collection of waste. It is possible that many other Gipuzkoans have some doubts about the prejudices that have been put on their heads against the collection of Puerta a Puerta in recent years.