Visitors from the “normal” villages, that is, those who send seven or eight out of ten of the mixed waste to landfill and incineration plants, have to hallucinate with the casets found in some streets of Gipuzkoa and Navarre and with the areas filled with composteras surrounded by fences. Leave the garbage accumulated in the houses on the street? Authorized by the City Hall? What do you say, driven by the city hall and awarded with bonuses? And after you get a piece of sweet land out of there?

In 2009, while participating in the exhibition to promote composting among their neighbors, an elderly man became angry when explaining the process: “Do you have to tell me that this [organic] is pulled and then comes this [compost]? Do you take me silly? Go to catch por-kulo?” and he left murmuting in Spanish.

Ignorance has not disappeared in the five years. Even worse, the elected and political leaders who want to be the guides of the citizenry continue to listen to the normal process of composting barbarities: dirt, scrubland, hygiene problems, rats… The phobias and prejudices that have been stuck for years in people’s heads are not erased in two days. But a churrupada was already heard in this same locality, in Hernani (19,000 inhabitants) of Gipuzkoa right now recycles in four public parks 70 families, a couple of other zients have registered, the city council will organize new spaces at the end of the year and, added to them, in their gardens or gardens, in 2014 more than 1,000 families will make compost. 1,000 of the 7,000 families living in the concrete and asphalt section are composting, if not for the revolution…

12,000 families in Gipuzkoa

With the help of Joxe Mari Irazusta, a militant of Usurbil Zero Zabor, we have compiled the statistics of Gipuzkoa, as not all mancommunities yet offer data together. In 2010 throughout Gipuzkoa there were 6,003 families eating. This figure collected the recycling promotion campaigns carried out by the communities that collected the packaging and other instruments and presented themselves to the course, leaving out of all accounts those that bought or bricolated tools on their own. This 2010 figure has changed dramatically in a short time: In August 2013, these 6,003 families reached 11,563. At the end of the year, the approval shall be 12,000.

The Baztan-Bidasoa Valley and the Sakanaldea of Navarra, to which I shall refer later, have nowhere seen an initiative of this kind. What has happened in Gipuzkoa and in these two regions of Navarre, what has not happened in the Duranguesado or in Amikuze? That some peoples have started widespread selective collection, about to start more, and in all of them they want to replace it with better management whenever they need landfills and incineration plants.

The fight against incineration in Gipuzkoa and the burning of waste in the Olazagutia cement plant in Sakana have led to the construction of an alternative by overcoming the mere protest against it. With many contradictions and vicissitudes, we will not expand here on the waste conflict that the ARGIA reader knows well. The fact that the collection is global and personalized is at the root of the conflicts, the Door to Door and other collection systems being studied without this name for the future. As a result, municipalities and communities can reward people who eat organic matter.

In non-customised systems, in containers, society punishes those who do well and rewards the indifferent, making everyone pay the same rate. The new system, in addition to obliging all citizens to make a small distinction, such as respect for zebra steps, makes it possible to distinguish who makes compost at home. And reward the effort. Reward him?

Certainly, the self-managed reuse of this 40% of household waste saves society from collection costs, pollution generated by transport and industrial processing of organic. As a counterpart, despite the rewards, the Administration should operate as many families as possible autonomously, and knows for sure that it will save these costs from personalized collection. After all, in the villages that have implanted the Door to Door, the number of families that deposit the compost in the garden or grass of their house is multiplied by the simple beginning of debates and processes.

Usurbil has also started

One of the keys is community composting in the great change of Gipuzkoa and Sakana. This activity, known elsewhere in the world, was premiered by Usurbil in November 2011. Irati Sarasua reported this same weekend that six families began to compose in a small land assigned by the City Hall. Soon it was 19 and by the time Sarasua wrote the chronicle, at six months there were already 65 in Usurbil. In September 2013, 143 operations are underway. In a village of 6,107 inhabitants (no more than 2,200 families), 650 families are managing their own organic, which accounts for more than a quarter of the population. A resounding success.

Another of the villages to be highlighted is Oñati. In 2010, 183 composting families have grown to 886 in two and a half years. The introduction of the Door to Door has also been one of the actions that have been carried out in the expansion of what is now called family self-compost and the success that the community composting points have had. When the new collection was launched in Oñati in July 2013, 211 families were working in community composting and the waiting list could not be met, with the aim of making the Door to Door and the construction of community composting areas as much as possible.

These municipalities and those that have started at Puerta a Puerta have also improved the figures of their respective communities. San Marcos, which covers Donostialdea, has gone from 2,617 families in 2010 to 3,563 in 2013. Urola Kosta 227 to 456. Urola Erdia 400 to 733. Debagoiena 790 to 2173. Sasieta 620 waste collection from the Goierri up to 1.151. Tolosaldea from 568 to 2,424 As in the general selective collection, the Debabarrena and Txingudi communities also appear in the Community composting, with far worse results.

These amounts have included, as we have said, people who compost separately and those who work in auzolan. It is worth mentioning those who have begun to participate in the new phenomenon of community composting, as it is almost the only way to extend this activity in a space as well urbanized as Gipuzkoa is.

More and more localities have introduced the new option. In the area of San Marcos (292 families in community composting), in San Sebastián there are 66 families involved in this activity, 15 in Lasarte-Oria. Urola Costa 173. Zumaia, which has known so much Jaleo, has placed 117 families in community composting. In the centre of the Urola (220) are Azpeitia (57) and Azkoitia (19), but very far away are Zestoa (81) and Aizarnazabal (63), which are much smaller.

Debagoiena (505) and Tolosaldea (593) have been proclaimed champions of community composting. All the peoples of the Upper Region have areas of community composting. Many of those from Tolosaldea, 167 families in Tolosa, 32 in Ibarra, 30 in Amasa-Villabona, 41 in Zizurkil… As some small towns from Tolosaldea go on the path of the Zero Zabor that Orendain has started, we will mention them a little later. The same applies to the Sasieta community serving the peoples of the Goierri: its statistics (only 44 families in community composting) should be taken with care, as many of its small towns are starting on the Orendain road.

Community composting is not taking place in Debabarrena except in Mutriku (17 families). Like in Irun and Hondarribia. Both counties have been stagnating in the selective collection in Gipuzkoa in figures similar to those in Spain.

Orendain, example of small towns

In November 2012, Orendain de Tolosaldea became the first small town in Zero Zabor in Gipuzkoa. Following what is done in many small towns of Europe and the world, as in Catalonia, to improve the results of those working at the Puerta a Puerta, in addition to generalizing selective collection, the orendarras began to reuse all organic waste without leaving their people. Since most families have some piece of land, everyone eats their own kitchen in their own way and some of the Kaxko’s plus the ones that create the village meeting places in Auzolan. In a special section we mention the special pig recycling organised by Orendain, backed by Ttip and Ttup.

Together with Orendain, there are 30 other municipalities that could turn Zero Zabor into Gipuzkoa, 15 into the region of Tolosaldea itself. So far, the press has officially reported that this is a system involving Orexa, Elduain, Altzo and Leintz Gatzaga. The good clue to find out where the rest of the process is located is that of the compostors of cars and neighborhoods. In Aduna, with 446 inhabitants, 121 families make compost in one way or another, 300 families in Amezketa with 951 inhabitants, 115 in Lizartza with 659 inhabitants…

The small municipalities of Zero Zabor occupy an important part of the territory of Gipuzkoa, as their population is scarce. And they've started to make them feel their voice in the waste debate. In particular, in the Tolosaldea community they propose to amend the criteria for the waste management fee to be paid for each municipality.

It is not logical for a municipality that generates a lot of garbage (between 70% and 80%) and that has managed to reduce the final rejection to 15% or less, to pay the service equally. As many municipalities recognize the promoters of family composting who save society by discounting their work and their bill, the community of Tolosaldea will do the same with its municipalities. Of course, this is going to focus a lot on the dispute over the waste hidden by the hum of the blue plastics from the balconies: “Polluter pays”, the polluter pays expenses and damages.

The ravine sacude Navarra

At a LARRUN, Alfonso del Val, an expert in waste, said that Navarre had once been the land that most influenced composting issues. This occurred in the early 1980s, when selective collection in some neighborhoods of the Comarca of Pamplona was very advanced. After a long period of extinction, journalist Irati Sarasua pointed out in 2011 that, in addition to those in their respective homes, the families of Egues, Oteiza, Labio, Badoztain, Subiza and Olatz Nagusia were working in community composting. Since then, 70 families have participated in the ARGIA accounting in the composting centres of Baztan and 32 in those of Malerreka.

Sakana is, however, one of the most relevant phenomena known to Navarre and probably the Basque Country in recent years in waste management. In addition to the economic crisis, Huarte, Lakuntza, Arbizu, Etxarri Aranatz, Bakaiku, Iturmendi, Urdiain and Olazti have brought selective collection to 76.30%. But what is most significant is the prominence given in the new collection system to domestic and community composting.

In the figures of the Sakana Commonwealth, there are 4,225 families engaged in composting. Considering that the region has a population of 20,768 inhabitants, it can be said that more than half of the sakandarras reuse their organic waste without leaving home or the street.

Data that greatly distorts the proportion: The municipalities of Alsasua (7,691 inhabitants) and Irurtzun (2,302) have not so far sought to rejoin the system. In both cases, the families in community composting are 89 in total. Of the 10,775 residents of Sakana, 4,136 are the families that carry out compost in one way or another. Gold medals are awarded with less favored brands.

Sakana wanted to give the debate about the waste living in Euskal Herria important components, in addition to the quantity, for its quality. One of those things that seems strange at first: The brown container for the organic Door to Door versus dispute Sakana leaders have insisted that “the brown container is community compost.” That is, citizens can choose to remove organic residue from the portal three times a week or deposit it whenever they want in the composting booth on the street, with little effort and with a bonus.

Without realizing it, this argument is also working in many of the neighboring towns of PaP, because when you lose the fear of pork food being prepared on the street, community composting has the advantage of having a freer, more didactic, cheaper time for the bonus…

Another novelty that Sakana has brought to the Basque society is that of the cabins for composting. In the Saint Philbert de Bouaine system, which has made fashionable the compost of the population in the French area of La Rochelle –“Compost Citoyenne” – the Sakandarras have launched local workshops and designers, one of which is that of composting wood, easy and cheap to build in large wooden containers that are used so far in Gipuzkoa. Those who tested it extol the more “gurea” aesthetic, the larger cavity, the ease of use and many other advantages of these slugs (with different measures that can protect different families).

To a greater extent, like Gipuzkoa, Sakana can be the small mirror of the crossroads that the Basque Country experiences in waste management. It brings together incineration, the opposite movement, the implementation of a pioneering alternative management system, the reactions that have been unleashed against it, the mess around the short-term calculations of some leaders and politicians… It is no coincidence that so many citizens and families have begun to behave both in one place and another.

Widespread selective collection requires a change in the habits of the public, within which the fear of waste is lost. Out of the pork meal phobias! The announcement “These people want us to turn back to the 19th century”, although so repeated, has been explained that it was not true: when it has been learned that the separation of the garbage from the kitchen has no complications, many neighbors and neighbors have realized that the organic that the administration leads through the porch and transforms it somewhere can also do it in the vegetable garden or in a large container of the street, easy, convenient and also enjoying a municipal discount.

That is why similar examples are being multiplied in all towns and cities. The students and teachers of many schools have long since begun to compost the surplus of the dining room, as shown by the nice video made by Gernika's ikastola Seber Altube. Now the citizens of all classes do so, although the institutions do not give them any prize for it. You've seen some exciting examples, like the street gardeners who are collecting the remains of the neighbors in the Larrabetzu neighborhood of Bizkaia, also this lovely video. And thousands of anonymous citizens trying to reclaim the land that's been taken from the land. Assuming a beautiful revolution, let our children have a slightly more fertile soil than the one we've taken.