Project profile — Mitigating Climate Change through Solid Waste Management in southern Jordan

The project aims to enhance local governance, coordination, and collaboration among all stakeholders in integrated solid waste management. This includes improving local waste and reusable materials infrastructure. The project seeks to create economic opportunities for women and youth to operate newly added or upgraded facilities. It also aims to promote recycling and upcycling of reusable materials. Project activities include: (1) building and equipping a materials recovery facility and composting plant. It also aims to rehabilitate a transfer station to enhance local capacity to sort waste from recyclable and upcyclable materials of marketable value; (2) engaging local communities, particularly women and youth, in operating new or upgraded facilities and developing the capacities of women and youth-led community-based organizations and their members in business development; (3) improving solid waste management practices and use of diverse waste streams such as recyclables, upcycling, and compost It does so to generate income and promote sound environmental and solid waste management practices at the community level; (4) strengthening the evidence linking improved solid waste management practices with climate change mitigation by partnering with local academic institutions; and (5) piloting a model to calculate the reduced carbon footprint and impact on the environment and community using improved solid waste management practices, which can be scaled to the national level.

The expected outcomes of this project include: (1) improved municipal solid waste management in 4 target municipalities of southern Jordan; (2) enhanced and provided equitable access to local economic opportunities related to the circular waste economy; and (3) enhanced cross-sector collaboration supporting climate change mitigation and solid waste management research.

Results achieved at the end of the project (March 2025) include: (1) approximately 86,970 residents (including 42,420 women) in Southern Jordan benefitted from improved solid waste services and outreach in New Shoubak, New Ayl, Al-Asha'ari, and PDTRA. This includes tourism sites and contributed to improved environmental conditions and service delivery in economically significant areas; (2) trained 87 individuals (65 women including 54 youth) through Community Based Organizations (CBO) to pursue green economy opportunities and local leadership roles; (3) created 132 jobs in the solid waste sector, 70.5% filled by women and 29.5% by young men, highlighting inclusive employment; (4) engaged 102 women and youth in CBO-led green businesses. 30 of them are employed in technical roles at the new Material Recovery Facility and composting plant; and (5) enhanced institutional capacity and collaboration among national and local actors, including the Ministry of Local Administration (MoLA), the Joint Services Council (JSC) of Shoubak, the 4 target municipalities, and 4 academic institutions.