APPENDIX 1
List of Definitions
“animal carcass” means any dead animal requiring special disposal methods and exclude infected
carcasses.
“bin” means a receptacle of capacity less than 1.5 m3 used for the temporary storage of waste on the
premises of the generator of the waste.
“bin liner” means a loose plastic or other suitable material liner approved by the regulatory authority
for use in the interior of a waste bin.
“building waste” includes all waste produced during the construction, alteration, repair or demolition
of any structure, and includes building rubble, earth, vegetation and rock displaced during such
construction, alteration, repair or demolition - see “construction and demolition waste”
“business waste” means waste that emanates from premises that are used wholly or mainly for
commercial, retail, wholesale, entertainment or government administration purposes;
“bulky waste” means general waste generated on any premises which by virtue of its mass, shape,
size and quantity is inconvenient to remove in the routine door to door waste collection service
provided by the local council.
"collection" means the act of picking up solid waste materials from homes, businesses, governmental
agencies, institutions, or industrial sites.
“compost” means organic waste, including garden waste, which has undergone controlled aerobic
microbial degradation, to produce a contaminant/nuisance free product of value as a soil conditioner.
“condemned food” means commercial food stuffs which could in any way pose a risk to human
health. This “special waste” requires special handling and management.
“container” means a disposable or reusable vessel in which waste is placed for the purposes of
storing, accumulating, handling, transporting, treating or disposing of that waste and includes bins,
bin-liners and skips;
“dailies” means putrescible general waste such as that generated by hotels, restaurants, food shops,
hospitals, canteens, etc., that must be collected on a more frequent, normally daily basis, to prevent
the waste from decomposing and presenting a nuisance, environmental or health risk. This excludes
hazardous or health care risk waste.
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“disposal site” means any facility designed, permitted in terms of section 20(1) of the Environment
Conservation Act and operated for the disposal of waste other than hazardous waste and health care
risk wastes.
“domestic waste” means waste, excluding hazardous waste, that emanates from premises used
wholly or mainly for residential, educational, healthcare, sport or recreation, purposes;
“domestic hazardous waste” means waste defined as hazardous in terms of a local municipality bylaw or other legislation.
“general waste” means waste that does not pose an immediate hazard or threat to people or the
environment and includes 
domestic waste;

business waste;

building waste; and

garden waste.
“garden waste” means waste generated as a result of normal domestic gardening activities, including
grass cuttings, leaves, plants, flowers and other similar small and light organic matter, but shall not
include tree branches with a diameter thicker than 40 millimetres at any point of its length, domestic
waste, bulky waste, construction and demolition waste or any waste generated as a result of
commercial garden service activities.
“garden service” means the provision of commercial gardening services including the cutting of
grass, pruning of trees or any other horticultural activity including landscaping, to any domestic,
business, commercial or industrial premises.
“illegal dumping” means waste that has been left at any place not designated as a waste processing
facility or waste disposal site.
“industrial waste” means waste generated as a result of manufacturing, maintenance, fabricating,
processing and dismantling activities, but shall not include building waste, business waste, special
industrial waste, hazardous waste, health care risk waste or domestic waste.
“level of service” means the frequency of the waste removal service and the type of service point.
“litter” means any object or matter which is discarded by a person in any place except in an approved
waste receptacle provided for that purpose or at a waste processing facility or waste disposal site.
“materials recycling facility” or materials reclamation facility means a specialised facility/plant
that receives, separates, sorts and prepares recyclable materials for marketing to end-user
manufacturers.
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“mixed waste” means and includes all collectible waste other than that which is collected as
recyclable materials or garden waste.
“on-site handling” means the activities associated with the handling, treatment, processing and
storage of waste at the source of generation before the waste is collected.
“premises” means an erf or any other portion of land, including any building thereof or any other
structure utilised for business, industrial or residential purposes.
“primary collection” means the gathering and loading up of waste from storage containers located
close to dwellings that generate the waste and the transport to the transfer point (secondary collection
point – communal storage area). Primary collection may also include the sweeping of streets and the
clearing of litter on the streets and open places within the area.
“public place” shall include any public building, public road, overhead bridge, subway, foot
pavement, footpath, sidewalk, lane, square, open space, garden, park, enclosed space vested in a
municipality, and any road, place or thoroughfare however created which is in the undisturbed use of
the public or which the public has the right to use or the right to access.
“public road” means any road, street or thoroughfare or any other place (whether a thoroughfare or
not) which is commonly used by the public or any section thereof or to which the public or any
section thereof has a right of access and includes –
(a)
the verge of any such road, street or thoroughfare;
(b)
any bridge, ferry, or drift traversed by any such road, street or thoroughfare;
(c)
any other work or object forming part of or connected with or belonging to such road,
street or thoroughfare.
“putrescible waste” means organic waste which is subject to rapid decomposition or decay.
“routine door-to-door service” means waste collected from households by means of routine
collection operations.
“recyclable waste” means waste which may be or has been separated from the waste stream and set
aside for purposes of re-use, reclamation and/or recycling.
“recycle” means to separate and process material from waste for further use as new products or
resources;
“road reserve” means the verge and the roadway of a public road as defined in the Road Traffic Act,
29 of 1989.
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“secondary collection” means the collection of waste placed at communal areas after primary
collection has taken place. This includes the transfer to secondary collection vehicles and the
subsequent transport of the waste to the disposal site.
“service point” means a designated place from where waste is collected on a routine collection basis.
means any government department, public entity, private person or business
operating within the province of Gauteng who is in the business of collecting general waste and or
recyclables from property where waste is generated for the transport, transfer, salvage, resource
recovery or disposal of that waste.
“source separation ” means the segregation, by the generator, of materials designated for separate
collection for some form of materials recovery, recycling, or special handling.
“street cleaning” means the cleaning of streets and roads, including road reserves and public places.
“sustainable development” means the integration of social, economic and environmental factors into
planning, implementation and decision-making so as to procure that the development serves present
and future generations.
“waste” includes any substance, whether solid, liquid or gaseous, which is –

discharged, emitted or deposited in the environment in such volume, constituency or manner as to
cause an alteration to the environment,

a surplus substance or which is discarded, rejected, unwanted or abandoned,

re-used, recycled, reprocessed, recovered or purified by a separate operation from that which
produced the substance or which may be or is intended to be re-used, recycled, reprocessed,
recovered or purified, or

identified as waste by prescribed by regulation;
(this definition of waste is subject to change as the law redefines waste through the Waste Bill
reiteration process. Should this occur, the latest definition will prevail).
“waste manifest system” means a formalised process of waste management, and can include
programmes that are used to store, edit and report on waste handling and transportation. It is a set of
forms, reports, and procedures designed to seamlessly track waste from the time it leaves the
generator facility where it was produced, until it reaches the off-site waste management facility that
will store, treat, or dispose of the waste. The system should allow the waste generator to verify that its
waste has been properly delivered, and that no waste has been lost or unaccounted for in the process.
“waste processing facility” means any facility where waste is taken for temporary storage, transfer,
sorting into recyclable waste fractions for recycling, re-use, treatment or final disposal at a disposal
facility.
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“wet waste” means those waste items which cannot be recycled and include items such as garden
waste, food scraps, disposable nappies, soiled paper, animal waste and other non-recyclable items
such as tetrapak containers.
GDARD – General Waste Collection Standards