CIMIC OPERATORS TO SUPPORT THE ENVIRONMENT

Lebanon.

An important project of the Italian contingent in Lebanon has ended few days ago with the donation of 3,670 containers for municipal solid waste to nine municipalities of the Unions of the municipalities of Tyre, Bint Jbeil and Tibnin. The project, planned and conducted by the Multinational CIMIC Group operators, as part of the CIMIC cell of Sector West, aimed at improving the sanitary hygiene conditions of the villages present in the area of responsibility of UNIFIL.

In Lebanon, the absence of environmental legislation and a sustainable waste management plan has caused, for years, the proliferation of various forms of pollution, including the indiscriminate accumulation of waste in illegal landfills.

The delivery of the bins represents one of the step performed by the MNCG operators, in conducting an information and awareness campaign on environmental issues that over the years the Italian Blue Helmets have conducted in local schools and municipalities, paying particular attention to the protection of citizens' health through the good practice of separate collection; the first step to allow the collected materials to fall within the economic and production cycle according to the principles of the circular economy.

MNCG operators work daily to connect the various civil bodies and organizations in order to facilitate functional projects to support the local population. Their hard work makes it possible to optimize the resources present in Lebanon, from economic to material ones. Through the liaison (one of the core functions of the CIMIC function) between civilian and military bodies, they represent a valid support for the Mission Commander and a reference point for non-military actors.

Similar initiatives, much appreciated by the Lebanese authorities and carried out with funds from the Ministry of Defence, have been coordinated always by the specialists of civil-military cooperation of MNCG and have concerned projects related to the collection, transport and treatment of waste (disposal or recycling) up to the reuse of waste materials for the reduction of effects on human health and the impact on the environment, implementing an already consolidated work plan such as the construction of composting plants, the donation of compactors and means for the collection and transport of waste in disposal plants and, last but not least, the use of CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear) teams specialized in the detection and sampling of potential sources of pollution.