Vinod Chandran & Sunil Herat 
Earthworms – The Waste Managers 
Their Role in Sustainable Waste Management Converting Waste into Resource While Reducing Greenhouse Gases

Millions of tons of municipal solid wastes (MSW) comprising a great proportion of ‘food & green garden wastes’ generated from homes and institutions are ending up in the landfills everyday, creating extraordinary economic problems for the local government and environmental problems for the society due to increasingly high cost of landfill construction, waste disposal and monitoring for emission of powerful ‘greenhouse gases’, ‘toxic gases’ and discharge of ‘leachate’ with serious risk of polluting groundwater. Studies indicate that vermi-composting of food and garden wastes by waste-eater earthworms is more efficient over the conventional aerobic systems. This book explores the possibilities of management in this area