In cities across Ukraine, local authorities use fallen leaves for various purposes instead of taking them to landfills or burning them.
The NGO "Ecological News" talked about the best practices of bio-waste management.
For example, in Odesa and Zaporizhzhia, leaves are not raked from under trees and bushes in forest parks, squares and other green areas, as this leads to the removal of organic fertilizers and a decrease in the insulating layer for the soil.
In Sumy, leaves are disposed of at temporary sites for storage of plant waste.
In Ternopil, Lutsk, and Rivne, some of the fallen leaves are used in cemeteries to prevent the soil from freezing.
And in Ivano-Frankivsk, it is mulched in parks and squares to protect plants from winter frosts.
Fallen leaves are composted in Cherkasy, Zhytomyr, Lutsk, Kyiv, Chernivtsi, Lviv, Mykolaiv, Khmelnytskyi, Ivano-Frankivsk, Chernivtsi and Rivne, Voznesensk and Druzhkivka.
The obtained biohumus is used in greenhouses (Zhytomyr) and for feeding the planting sites of green plantations (Rivne), or sold to agricultural enterprises (Lviv).
Several methods of leaf disposal are used in Lutsk: they are taken to cemeteries and private households to prevent soil freezing, for the needs of the Lutsk Zoo, and, of course, they are composted.
"We are sure that this is far from a complete list of settlements in Ukraine where fallen leaves are beneficial," say eco-activists.
Earlier, EcoPolitic told how to safely remove fallen leaves. We also indicated the comment of the ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets, what are the consequences of burning fallen leaves and other vegetation.
