Egypt Kills All Pigs— But Pigs Eat All Trash

With no swine to eat garbage, waste piles up on city streets

By Nick McMaster, Newser Staff

Posted Sep 20, 2009 12:48 PM CDT

(Newser) – When the Egyptian government decided to kill all of Cairo’s pigs last spring in a pre-emptive measure to combat swine flu, they apparently forgot that the pigs performed a vital function in a city with poor public services: eating trash, the New York Times reports. The zabaleen, Cairo’s Christian minority, used to collect trash door-to-door, selling recyclables and feeding the organic waste to their pigs. With all their pigs dead, the zabaleen leave the trash, which now overflows in the streets.

“They killed the pigs, let them clean the city,” said one zabaleen and former garbage collector. “Everything used to go to the pigs, now there are no pigs, so it goes to the administration.” The government has brought in Western-style waste collection companies, who have installed public trash bins, but the city’s population, used to the zabaleen's service, hasn't adapted to the new system.

[Images (2)]

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Egyptian pig owners cull their animals with knives in the desert, at 6th October City near Cairo, in Egypt, Saturday, May 16, 2009. (AP Photo/Nasser Nouri)

An Egyptian boy plays next to pigs near a private farm in Cairo, Egypt, Tuesday, April 28, 2009. (AP Photo/Nasser Nouri)

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The whole area is trash. All the pathways are full of trash. When you open up your window to breathe, you find garbage heaps on the ground.
- Ramadan Hediya, Cairo resident

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Egypt Kills All Pigs— But Pigs Eat All Trash