Recycling Guatemala is a project that aims to develop and improve the waste management system in Almolonga, a small agricultural village in the western highlands of Guatemala. The project started April 1st 2002 and will be finished by February 2003.

Problem
The waste collection system in the village is suspected to have substantial room for improvement. The collection system consists of domestic garbage containers, transport units and a collection crew.

The village is currently constructing a treatment plant for classification of waste and an area for composting of organic matter. The output of the composting process will be organic fertilizer / soil improvement products. Within 6 months there will probably be constructed a landfill for non-re-usable inorganic waste. There are currently no concrete plans on how to handle and take advantage of re-usable inorganic matter.

The knowledge on environmental issues, such as contamination, material biodegradability, deforestation etc, is low.