The Ministerial Committee for Interior and Service Affairs approved on Sunday a
new version of the Environmental Protection Ministry’s National Master Plan,
that will grant priority to waste treatment and recycling over burying garbage
in landfills, the ministry said on Monday.
The new program, which
replaces the previous National Master Plan of 1989, will shorten the procedures
necessary for acquiring waste treatment facility building permits in industrial
zones, and will only require companies to get permits from the local authority
or committee involved, according to a statement from the
ministry.
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‘Palestinians must step up sewage recycling'Meanwhile, construction will be allowed to begin quite quickly,
following an environmental examination of the space that demonstrates no
irregularities as well as a public announcement.
“We have removed [on
Sunday] a significant bureaucratic obstacle toward implementing the revolution
of recycling and transforming waste into a resource,” Environmental Protection
Minister Gilad Erdan said in a statement.
“The National Master Plan
encourages the market to make use of waste and raw materials whose ingredients
create benefits for everyone – environmental, economic and health
benefits.”
The “revolution,” Erdan’s office said, has turned “from dream
to reality.” As far as landfills go, the New Master Plan also updates
regulations and creates mandatory rehabilitation guidelines for both planned and
active sites, the statement said. Equally crucial to the new plan is the call to
establish district committees that handle waste, the ministry said.