N. Kannan, M. Prabhaharan and V. Jayapiratha
The problem of municipal solid waste management is an alarming dimension in Sri Lanka during the last few decades. Due to the population growth and economic development, municipal solid waste per capita is increased daily. In Jaffna the collection and removal of municipal solid waste has become a serious problem. Toddy distillery Spent Wash (TDSW) is an effluent generated from the distilleries located in the Jaffna peninsula having good nutritional properties for the plant growth. But open dumping of this effluent causes severe environmental degradation. Hence the new concept was developed to convert the decomposable solid waste into organic fertilizer by spraying toddy distillery spent wash (TDSW) pit method of composting was selected for the experiment which was conducted in completely randomized design (CRD) with five treatments and three replicates. Treatments were T1,T2,T3,T4 and C those are once/week, once/two week, once/3week, and once/month and without spraying TDSW respectively. Statistical analysis showed that the total and available nitrogen in the compost produced from T1 had significantly differed from other treatments. Hence this T1 sample and sample from C were applied to the tobacco plants at the field. The average length and width of demarked leaves were measured at weekly interval. The maximum average length and width of the plants under the treatments T1 and C were 60cm, 52cm and 32cm, 27cm respectively. The average length for the T1 treated plants and C treated plants ranges from 32 -60 cm and 24 -52 cm respectively whereas width of the leaves for T1 treated and C treated plants ranges 14 -32 cm and 10 -27 cm respectively. There were significant differences in both length and width of the leaves from T1 to C. This was due to the good supply of nutrients from the DSW treated compost than the compost from the control. Based on the results the enriched compost is good for the plant growth and this would be the best option to manage both TDSW and Municipal solid waste without environmental degradation.
Key words: Municipal solid waste, Organic fertilizer, Tobacco, Growth
N. Kannan, M. Prabhaharan and V.Jayapiratha Department of Agricultural Engineering, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Jaffna, Sri Lanka.