Home Funded Projects A nylon 'sock' that traps litter before it reaches Lake Victoria
Water, Sanitation & Environment
A nylon 'sock' that traps litter before it reaches Lake Victoria
A re-usable nylon trap that captures up to 152 kg of litter in a drainage channel — emptied by simply untying it.
Every rainstorm washes city trash toward Lake Victoria. This simple, re-usable trap catches it in the channel first.
The challenge
Every rainfall washes trash and debris from Kampala and Jinja through drainage channels into Lake Victoria — Uganda's largest freshwater source.
In the Lubigi wetland, an important catchment home to over 200 bird species including the crested crane, the channel chokes with polythene and silt — causing flooding, harming wildlife and degrading the wetland.
The approach
The team designed a soft nylon mesh 'sock', laid on a metal frame along the flow of the channel, to capture floating litter and debris. When full, it is simply untied at the base, emptied into a city garbage truck, re-tied and slotted back — cleanable as often as needed.
They first mapped the channel and characterised the waste, so the trap could be sized correctly.
The trap holds up to 152 kg of litter before it needs emptying — and is simply untied to clear.
Results & impact
The final trap — 1.2 m long, 1.2 m in diameter, with a diamond-mesh opening — retains about 55 kg of litter per hour and can hold up to 152 kg before it needs emptying.
It gives cities a low-cost, re-usable way to keep drains clear and litter out of the lake, and the team recommends deploying such traps across secondary and tertiary channels.
This research was funded by the Government of Uganda through the Makerere University Research and Innovations Fund — one of a growing directory of projects turning national investment into real-world results.
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