Speaker
Description
steep, high-density tropical cities, improper solid waste management and topsoil erosion severely impair urban ecosystem functions, triggering devastating landslides and disrupting soil macroinvertebrate communities. In Bukavu (DRC), unstable topography combined with uncontrolled waste dumping threatens both human settlements and urban micro-habitats.
This contribution, led by the Anansoft Foundation, explores an innovative framework that couples community-driven waste management with ecological forecasting to restore urban soil integrity. By implementing decentralized waste sorting and organic composting schemes, our initiative addresses the root causes of drainage blockage and slope destabilization. Concurrently, we utilize ecological modeling to simulate how structured, community-led waste reduction mitigates habitat degradation and promotes the recovery of indigenous soil biodiversity and microbial networks.
Our findings indicate that restoring soil physical structure through sustainable waste interventions significantly reduces urban run-off velocity and enhances ecosystem resistance to extreme weather events. Furthermore, reintegrating organic matter into degraded soils revives essential biological functions, stabilizing slopes while fostering urban green spaces. By aligning grassroot environmental sanitation with soil conservation models, this study provides a transferable template for iDiv’s core themes. It demonstrates that transforming urban waste management from a public health challenge into an ecological asset directly enhances urban biodiversity and protects vulnerable human communities from climate-induced disasters.
| Status Group | Master Student |
|---|---|
| FOR TALKS: Poster Presentation Option | Yes, I’m willing to present as a poster. |