Cleaner Production is creative way of thinking about products and processes that make them. It is achieved by the continuous application of strategies aimed at minimizing the generation of wastes and emissions at source. Conventionally, environmental management has relied upon setting upon pollution control equipment to treat liquid effluents or gaseous emissions and bringing down the concentration of pollutants to within the stipulated limits. However, this approach has proved to be inadequate because, it mostly transfers pollutants from one media to the other; it assumes that the environment has enough capacity to take care of the residual pollution by itself; it rarely bring about an absolute reduction in the quantity of pollutants; and it is often cost-effect, with hardly any benefits to the entrepreneur and is, therefore, looked upon as an unavoidable dent in profits.

A better approach, now accepted worldwide, is to supplement the conventional approach with Cleaner Production (CP). The trend is towards making managerial and/ or technical interventions to make the industrial operations inherently pollution free. However, it should also be clearly understood that waste minimization, however attractive, is not a panacea for all environmental problems and may have to be supported by conventional treatment/ disposal systems. CP is best practiced by reducing the generation of waste at source, recycle, recover and reuse and finally by modifying or reformulating the product to be able to manufacture it with the least waste generation. Employed techniques include good house keeping; process change (input material change, better process control, equipment modification, technology change); recycling (onsite recovery/reuse, creation of useful by-products); and product reformulation or modification. Good house keeping measures have been known to constitute 40 – 50% reduction in waste generation, these measures include issues such as repairing all leaks, keeping taps closed when not in use, and avoiding spillages.

Center of Excellence in Cleaner Production.

The Kenya National Cleaner Production Centre (KNCPC) was established in July 2000 by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Government of Kenya through the Kenya Industrial Research and Development Institute (KIRDI). The Centre is now a registered Trust that falls under the Government of Kenya Programmes for Environment and Natural Resources Management. The Center’s function is to build national capacity to implement Cleaner Production (pollution prevention) programmes in industry and businesses. The Centre prides itself with the ability to work with industrialists to improve on their performance.

The Centre has a multi-stakeholder management board drawn from UNDP, UNEP, UNIDO, KIRDI, Ministry of Trade and Industry, Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, Kenya Association of Manufactures (KAM), Federation of Kenya Employers (FKE) and the National Environment Management Authority. There are 35 National Cleaner Production Centers (NCPCs) in the World, of which 10 are in Africa.