While politicians and business leaders debate climate policy in air-conditioned boardrooms, thousands of Ghanaians are already doing the hard work. Before dawn. In the dust. With no fancy titles.
Ing. Glenn Kwabena Gyimah (PhD), General Manager of the Jospong Group’s Green Transition Office, wants the country to finally recognise them.
Speaking at the World Environment Day 2026 National and African Climate Dialogue on Metro TV, the engineer and climate action expert spent part of his presentation talking about the people most Ghanaians simply walk past every day.
“On any given morning, before the city fully awakes, even as early as 5am, we have thousands of people who are already at work in our waste economy,” he said.
“We find the Zoomlion [Ghana Limited] team sweeping our streets. We find door-to-door businesses knocking on doors. At landfill sites such as Prampram and others, informal waste pickers sort through what society has thrown away.”
“To most of these people, it is rubbish. But to them, it is a survivor. An income. An opportunity.”
One heap, three different eyes
Ing. Gyimah asked listeners to picture a single pile of waste.
“From the same heap of waste, one person sees pollution. Another sees material for recycling. Another perceives it as livelihood.”
He said that single scene captures everything he wanted to share.
“Value is often hidden in what we choose to ignore. For many of us, we have ignored waste for far too long. But it is a pathway for inclusive growth.”
He argued that if Ghanaians can reorient their minds, if they can see what the waste pickers see, then the country can keep its environment clean and build resilient communities at the same time.
Not heroes, but not beggars either
Ing. Gyimah did not romanticise the situation. He knows the waste pickers work under terrible conditions. No safety gear. No health insurance. No recognition.
But he said the solution is not to look down on them or push them away. It is to bring them in.
One of the five key systems he proposed was the “integration of informal waste collectors into the formal system.”
“By so doing, we are able to bring all on board and drive towards a sustainable, inclusive growth and provide dignified livelihood to all.”
He did not use big words like “social inclusion framework” or “stakeholder alignment.” He just said: give these people dignity. They are already doing the job.
The metals, the plastics, the survival
Ing. Gyimah noted that the scavengers on the streets and at landfills are the ones recovering metals, plastics, and other valuable materials that would otherwise be burned or buried.
These same materials, he explained, feed into industries and reduce the need for virgin mining.
“They go around the metals,” he said simply. “Which is also meant for use in our industries, reducing virgin dependency and lowering industrial energy demand.”
What needs to change?
According to Ing. Gyimah, Ghana cannot keep pretending that a few recycling plants and some street sweepers are enough.
He called for policies that strengthen waste segregation, better infrastructure for collection and sorting, digital tools to track materials, and most importantly, financing that treats waste projects as serious investments.
But his heart was clearly with the people at the bottom of the heap.
“Waste is no longer a sanitation issue,” he said. “It is increasingly recognised as a resource stream with economic value. Generating value, creating employment, reducing emissions, and supporting industrial development.”
A quiet army
He said the people crawling through landfills at 5am are not a problem to be solved. They are a workforce to be embraced.
“The future of waste management in Ghana is not disposal. It is recovery, transformation, and a value-creating industry.”
And if that future is going to work, he argued, the ones who already understand the value of waste must be at the table.
“The choice before us is clear. Continuing with systems that waste our resources and limit our future. Or embrace a circular model that creates jobs, restores ecosystems, and strengthens national resilience.”
