August 29 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria and the EU have jointly provided close to 300 million levs ($170 million/153.4 million euro) for recultivation of waste deposit sites in the country, the environment ministry said.
Year-to-date, local municipalities have already received 100 million levs in funds provided by the state and the EU's Operational programme Eenvironment 2014-2020 to recultivate part of the waste depots which do not meet the current environmental standards, the ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
The state budget has allocated an additional 70 million levs for recultivation of waste deposit sites during 2019. A further 120 million levs is being provided by the EU after an amendment to Operational programme Environment 2014-2020, aiming to provide the entire financial resource needed for the remaining non-recultivated waste depots. Their recultivation must be completed in 2020.
The investments envisage closure and recultivation of old waste depots which are in breach of environmental requirements as well as setting up new regional systems for waste management.
The recultivation and closure of all municipality-owned landfills which do not meet the requirements set by the EU is a financial priority. There are about 110 such waste depots in the country, with some of them already recultivated, the ministry said.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)