Development and Application of an Efficient Bacterial Liquid Inoculum for Composting of Organic Kitchen Waste

Abstract

The growing population along with urbanization have resulted in a rapid rise in the generation of organic waste. Neglecting the proper treatment of this waste would cause pollution and pose health risks. Households, restaurants, canteens and hotel waste constitute kitchen waste. Every day our growing cities generate more and more waste, which is overloading our municipal systems. Kitchen waste contains a high proportion of biodegradable organic material and therefore, microorganisms can play an important role in its degradation. So, a study was conducted to develop an efficient bacterial liquid inoculum for the composting of organic kitchen waste. The Liquid microbial inoculum is capable of coexisting and bringing out effective degradation of organic waste. The biological treatment of kitchen waste appears to be the most cost effective and carrier less negative environmental impact. Composting at home can be used as a sound method of kitchen waste management and the waste can be managed at the source itself and there by recycled. The microbial inoculum showed significant outcome for composting parameters such as Moisture content, Temperature, pH, Organic Carbon, Nitrogen, C:N ratio, Phosphate, Potash, Bulk density, Electric conductivity and Heavy metal analysis. The results show that the created microbial inoculum needs less time to produce compost that contains high nutrients than standard composting methods. The importance of this study exists because it offers a budget-friendly and sustainable method to handle kitchen waste that operates independently from centralized systems. The system decreases municipal waste system demands while it transforms organic waste into useful compost which helps advance sustainable waste management solutions and circular economy practices.