Agency To Formalise Nigeria’s Informal Waste Sector

The National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA) has unveiled a fresh strategy aimed at integrating thousands of informal waste pickers, collectors and recyclers into Nigeria’s formal recycling and environmental management system through a Cooperative-Led Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) model.

Director-General of National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency, Professor Innocent Barikor, disclosed this during a virtual stakeholders’ sensitisation programme on the Cooperative-Led EPR Model organised by the agency for key actors in the EPR value chain.

Barikor said the initiative was designed to close the long-standing exclusion gap within Nigeria’s waste management ecosystem by formally recognising and empowering informal waste workers who play a major role in recycling activities across the country.

According to him, the new framework will organise waste collectors, sorters and recyclers into legally recognised cooperatives, enabling them to access financing, social protection schemes, digital identity systems, governance structures and environmental compliance support.

He noted that the move would not only strengthen Nigeria’s EPR implementation but also improve environmental accountability and data management within the recycling sector.