WASTE MANAGEMENT AS A TOOL FOR REVENUE GENERATION (A CASE STUDY OF RIWAMA RIVERS STATE)

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

1. The Concept of Solid Waste Management

Since the start of life in the world, history shows that waste control and management has never been is never and shall never be avoided. In this way, a number of ancient scholars and the modern scholars in environmental management, IT and many more have dwelt in waste management with the ever increasing industrialization activities and doubling population after every century. According to Regional Centre for Urban and Environmental Studies (2014), Solid Waste Management (SWM) is a process that involves the collection, storage, transportation, processing and discarding of solid refuse residuals in an engineered sanitary landfill. This process is integrated and comprising of several collection methods, storage, various transportation equipment, recyclable material from recovery mechanisms, reduction of waste quantity and volume using approaches such as composting, waste-to-power and disposal in a designated engineered sanitarylandfill.

The source and quality of waste produced influences the selection of a suitable SWM process. Solid waste is generated from a number of sources which include households (kitchen and yards), commercial areas such as hotels, shops, and eateries, industries (packaging and raw material), institutions such schools, offices, and schools, demolition sites and construction, animals that are domesticated and wild (manure, carcasses of dead animals), streets (sand, silt, clay, concrete, bricks, asphalt, residues from air deposition and dust), parks (leaves from trees, fallen branches) etc. (IPCC,2012).

In his work entitled, "Waste Management Practices," Davidson (2011) started by giving a simple definition of the waste management idea and later on the brief history of the evolution of the waste management idea so that one can easily understand the concept. According to him, management of waste is the combination of undertakings that include: collecting, transporting, treating and disposing of waste; monitoring, controlling, and regulating of production, transport, collection, treatment and disposal of waste; and prevention of waste production through in- modification process, recycling and reuse. Science Direct (2013) maintains that, waste management commonly refers to all kinds of waste, that are either produced when extracting of raw materials, processing of raw materials into intermediary and finished products, usage of end products, or human activities, such as agricultural, special (sewage sludge, health care, household hazardous wastes), and municipal (residential, institutional,commercial).

According to United Nations Environmental Programme (2013), management of waste is intentioned to minimize the effect of waste on environment, aesthetics, or health. Waste management include: waste generation, removal of waste, minimization of waste, transporting waste, treating waste, reusing and recycling, storing, collecting, landfill disposal, financial and marketing aspects, environmental considerations, policing and regulating, training and educating, implementation and planning. Still, management of waste practices are not identical amongst both developed and developing nations, urban and rural regions and residential and industrial sectors.

According to National Waste & Recycling Association (2013), during the course of history, the quantity of waste than humans have generated wasn’t significant as a result of the low density and low levels of societal exploitation of natural resources. Waste that was frequently produced during pre-modern times was mainly human biodegradable waste and ashes, and these got released back locally into the ground, to result to lessening of the environmental impact. The tools having been made from metal or wood were usually reused or passed down through the generations. Nevertheless, there are some of the civilizations that seem to be more profligate in producing waste than the others. Particular, in Central America, the Maya had a fixed ritual monthly, where those in the village would come together to burn their rubbish in largedumps.

1. Employment Opportunities and Income generation in the community

Globally, studies have shown that waste management projects have been central in creating employment for both the poor Ghetto dwellers, the middle class who get jobs in various industries that recycle waste and finally the wealth company’s owners who run a number of companies that manage the wastes. In his study in the densely populated Asian countries, Sakai et al (2011) observe that the informal sector undertakes most recycling of MSW in India as a form of employment. The formal recycling set-up in India in a minor fraction and is only in its initial stages, experimenting different models tough takes care of both the aged and young non- employed people inIndia.

Sakai et al (2011) continue to show that, the waste pickers (WPs), itinerant waste buyers, dealers and recycling units do most of all the recycling in India which is entirely the informal sector. The largest population in the informal sector is comprised of the WPs; meaning that this is a group of non-skilled people that include street children and OVC who pick the waste papers, plastic bottles, e-wastes, and many more for sale. Generally, recyclables are collected in two ways; paper, glass and metal are collected before they enter the MSW stream from households on an instant payment basis, by a special group of people called ‘Kabariwala’ (from here on referred to as itinerant waste buyers) and plastics are generally collected by waste-pickers from litter on streets or from heaps of waste in landfills (Niringiye & Omortor, 2010). Shopkeepers sell recyclable items, such as newspaper, cardboard, glass containers, tin cans etc. to itinerant waste buyers too. Wastepickers retrieve recyclable materials like milk bags, plastic cups and containers, glass, etc. from what is discarded by households, commercial establishments and industries. Larger commercial establishments and industries sell the recyclable waste (source separated or otherwise) to waste dealers in bulk, who then sell it to recycling units (MDG Report, 2013).

While studying the role of waste management companies to the lives of the poor locals in Pakistan, Haiti and Lesotho, Jakub et al. (2011) argue that, The informal recycling sector in India, Pakistani, Haiti, Lesotho and elsewhere in the developing countries has benefits that includes: supplementing the formal system and subsidizes it financially, it also generates employment to a substantial share of the population both at the professional level, skilled, non- skilled and the neglected humans like street boys and drug abusers, it competitively operates with high efficiency levels, operating profitably producing surplus, at some point linking up with formal economy in the recycling chain, by making recycling possible and thus reducing the extraction and use of virgin raw materials etc thus offsets carbonemissions.

In their writing, Xavier et al. (2010) focused on the usefulness of solid waste management projects especially those handled the recyclable plastics in the urban centres in Nigeria, Uganda and Tanzania to the locals. For example, Plastics, due to its advantages like its durability, lightness, and ease to be molded, is used everywhere by most people and can easily be picked by the disadvantaged and the advantaged in the society to earn them a living. In Dodoma, Shinyanga, Tabora, Nairobi, Isiolo, Nanyuki, Jinja, Kamplala and Mbale, waste plastics were found to be useful in many areas. For example: In domestic purposes whereby they are used as carry bags, pet bottles, trash bags, containers; In air, road, rail travel: As cold drink or mineral water bottles, plastic plates, cups; In hospitals: As glucose or other IV fluid bottles, disposable syringes and injections, catheters, wine bags, gloves; In shops and hotels: As packing items, plastic bags and disposable utensils. According to them, this has enabled a number of citizens in countries get a number of opportunities while these plastics for example arerecycled.

GPRB (2010) report has outlined a number of areas where waste management has created jobs for the locals in two countries-namely Nigeria and India. One specific area where jobs are created for the locals by the waste management projects is on the onsite handling, processing and storage. In Jalandhar city India and Nairobi City of Nigeria for example, most of the habitable/residential areas have limited storage spaces. In these areas, the waste is of mostly of a biodegradable nature. This dumping is normally done by non-skilled employees in companies or homesteads like the house maids, cleaners and manymore.

Another point where jobs for the people are created is at the Handling phase. This refers to the activities associated with managing SW until they are placed in the containers used for their storage before collection or return to drop off and recycling centers. According to the World Bank (2013) for example, waste handlers in Manila and Nairobi are casual laborers who are employed to load the waste into municipal vehicles, other credited waste management companies’ vehicles, personal carts and many more. Nyaga (2014) notes that in Mombasa just as the situation is in other parts of the country, a number of projects have been initiated by the county government that has distributed waste handling trucks at various points where individuals are to empty their waste into. He further argues that in cases where the trucks are far from the residents, the MCAs have partnered with village administrators and distributed Carts (mikikoteni) that are under a group of 10 jobless youth per cart so that they can earn a living fromit.

Solid waste segregation is another point where both employed people work at and the self- employed ones. Studies in Nigeria’s Kisumu, Nairobi’s Dandora Dumping site and the Jomvu Dumping site in Mombasa have shown that SW is not segregated; rag pickers collect SW from the streets, bins and deposit sites. Storage spaces are not often adequate. People drop the SW outside the bins. This has led to the creation of jobs to the youths and other people employed at the waste management firms/NGOs/CBOs so as to come up with ways of trying to sort out the waste. In normal occasions, the UNEP waste picking points in Nairobi and Mombasa for example have created over 2212 youths especially the street children who segregate/sort out the better valuable items like e-waste, plastic bottles etc. which they later sale (Maloba, Nelson Isaac,2012).

Afroz & Masud (2011) looked at the importance of waste collection Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and Nairobi, Nigeria and argued that: SW that is collected from the bins from every point and collection from residential areas is carried out daily as the organic matter decomposes rapidly due to a hot climate being witnessed due to climate change. They continue to argue that, this collection of waste has created jobs for over 12% of the street children in the tow capital cities; a number of whom have come up with structuredorganisations.

1. Environmental Pollution and the Welfare of the LocalCommunity

Kuria & Mireri (2010) have given a definition of pollution. Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that causes adverse change. Pollution can take the form of chemical substances or energy, such as noise, heat or light. Pollutants, the components of pollution, can be either foreign substances/energies or naturally occurring contaminants.

Pollution is often classed as point source or nonpoint source pollution.

Rich literature exists across the globe in relation to the environmental effects as a result of SW management by various bodies in the world. According to Zhuang, Wang, Wu & Chen (2010) one major environmental issue associated with the private and municipal SW management projects in China today is the issue of surface water contamination. They argue that, in the eastern parts of the country for example, Waste that end up in water bodies negatively change the chemical composition of the water. Technically, this is called water pollution. This will affect all ecosystems existing in the water. It can also cause harm to animals and families that drink from such polluted water. This has been confirmed by Stringer (2014) water pollution is a major challenge as a result of SW management programmes operating in India, Pakistani, Malaysia, Ecuador, Ghana, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Nigeria today. According to him, unsanitary landfills for example contaminate surface and ground water resources when the leachate created percolates through the soil strata into the underneath groundwater or during rains it is washed as runoff. Leachate is commonly a strong reducing liquid formed under methanogenic (anaerobic) conditions. The content of various constituents in the dumped waste give the characteristics of leachate (GoI,2013).

Studies on Environmental Quality in and around Municipal Solid Waste Dumpsite in Kolkata, by World Bank (2010) found that areas managed by municipal waste control project initiatives had moderately high concentrations of heavy metal in groundwater surround the dumpsite. The study found out that the groundwater quality has been significantly affected by leachate percolation.

Similar studies by UNDP (2011) in Lesotho’s capital city, Nigeria’s Nairobi, and Uganda’s capital city Kampala highlighted on the role of SW management projects implementation and the associated environmental pollution with a specific bias to ground water pollution. In Nairobi and Kampala for example, the study touched on Leachate. It showed that Leachate usually contains organic chemicals formed by heavy metals leached from inorganic wastes and anaerobic digestion of organic wastes. The heavy metals generally observed in leachate are Cadmium (Cd), Chromium (Cr), Lead (Pb), and Nickel (Ni).

All these heavy metals are characterized as toxic for drinking water. Due to the reducing property of leachate, during percolation through soil strata, it reacts with Iron (Fe) and Manganese (Mn) species underground and reduces them into more soluble species, thus increasing their concentrations in groundwater Nyokabi (2011). Such reactions when they occur, pose a serious drinking water toxic risk. These predictions are substantiated by studies which found high concentrations of Cr, Cd and Mn in groundwater due to leachate percolation. Nitrates present in the environment can also be reduced to nitrites due to leachate. Nitrites consumed through drinking water can oxidize haemoglobin (Hb) in the blood to methaemoglobin (met Hb), thereby inhibiting the transportation of oxygen around the body (Habitat International, 2010). The study clearly establishes that waste landfills in Nairobi, Kampala and elsewhere are potential sources of heavy metals contamination in groundwater sources adjoining the landfills. It also points out that there is an urgent need to adopt credible solutions to control water pollution due to indiscriminate dumping ofwastes.

Lilia & Casanova (2010) in their work, Assessing the Range of Options for PPP in Expanding Waste Management Services in Developing Countries, have touched on an issue caused by the various projects managing the SW and how they have led to soil contamination in countries like Ethiopia, Philippines, Nigeria, Angola and Nigeria. According to them, hazardous chemicals that get into the soil (contaminants) can harm plants when they take up the contamination through their roots. If humans eat plants and animals that have been in contact with such polluted soils, there can be negative impact on their health.

1. TheoreticalFramework

This sub-section presents the theoretical approach from institutional analysis according to Scott (2001) cited by Amfo-out et al (2012) and Capacity Building according to Lesley Rushton (2011). Due to the nature of the setting of the research, the researcher adopted the Principles of urban ecology theory. Urban ecology, which in German is known as Stadtökologie, embodies the idea that humans influence the natural environment in their cities.

This theory originates from the “biology notion of the interaction of living things and their environment” in times were cities were not considered a study field for ecologists, biologists and environmentalists (Marcotullio et al, 2003cited by Kim, 2014). This belief emerges from the natural sciences domain in European countries and was put forward by scholars who wanted to demonstrate that humans living in cities had similar interactions with nature as plants in their own ecosystems by using the principles of ecology (Tan Yen Joe,2012).

The idea that cities were indeed ecosystems also provided the possibility to re-examine cities and to add other components to biotope and ecological interpretations (Sukopp, 1998 cited in Wang, Yoonhee and Kamata, 2011). Namely, studies regarding human behavior and its impact on the natural environment, and explorations on urban growth and its influence on the transformation of land can be included as an extended study format under the concept of urban ecology. Sukopp andWittigoffertwodefinitionsofurbanecology:Biologicalstandpoint,whereby,Urban ecology is a branch discipline of ecology and deals with biocenosis, biotopes, ecosystems, their organisms, and the conditions of their habitats, as well as structure, function, and history of urban ecosystems (1998). Integrated standpoint is another definition of, whereby, Urban ecology in its broader sense is an integrated field of research of scientists from various fields and of planning with the goal of improving quality of life and a long lasting ecologically sound urban development (Dawei,2012).

These statements are somewhat different from the views of Chicago scholars such as Park and Burgess who have developed a sociological approach based on the views of space competition and social characterization. They suggested that cities were environments similar to nature, influenced by different forces. One of them is the competition of different groups for physical space and the distribution of individuals in different “colonies”. The authors compare “natural areas” to “areas of population segregation”. Their definition of human ecology is expressed as “a study of the spatial and temporal relations of human beings as affected by the selective and accommodative forces of the environment” (Park, Burgess, Mckenzie, 1925 cited by Banga, 2011).