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An Assessment Of The Management Of Garbage Collection And Waste Disposal
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Waste
management is the process of collecting, transporting, processing or
disposing, managing and monitoring of waste materials. The term usually
relates to materials produced by human activity and the process is
generally undertaken to reduce their effect on health, the environment
or aesthetics. The major focus of this research is on waste management
practices as obtains in the urban developing nations. Waste includes all
items that people no longer have any use for, which they either intend
to get rid of or have already discarded and these include: packing items
garden waste, old paints containers, vegetables, metals etc. Poor waste
management has been a major problem to human health and existence,
affecting both rural and urban areas. A clean environment influences
good health and good health further affects the productivity of man.
Therefore, it can be said that a good and clean environment invariably
affects the wealth and economic status of the nation.
There are
various methods of waste disposal including: land filling: which
involves burying the waste in abandoned or unused quarries, mining voids
or burrow pits and covering it with layers of soil; incineration:
involves subjection of solid organic wastes to combustion at a very high
temperature of about 10,000 so as to convert them into residue or
gaseous products; open dumping: whereby dumping can be done on open land
or sea; composting: this is an aerobic, biological process of
degradation of biodegradable organic matter; hog feeding: this involves
feeding animals like pigs with left over materials of waste; mechanical
destructor: this involves the use of machines to destroy waste
materials. Recycling of waste which means taking waste materials and
transforming them into raw products, results in saving natural
resources, saving energy, reducing disposal costs, reducing harmful
emission to air and water, saving money and creating jobs.
Awareness
and knowledge of waste disposal is influenced by many factors as pointed
out in a work done by Margaret Banga on household knowledge, attitudes
and practices in solid waste segregation and recycling in urban Kampala.
It indicated that the participation in solid waste separation
activities depended on the level of awareness of recycling activities in
the area, household income, educational level and gender. Ayodeji
Ifegbesan studied the waste management awareness knowledge and practices
of secondary school teachers in Ogun state and it showed that teachers
were aware and knowledgeable about waste management even though they
possessed negative waste management practices. There seems to be
appreciable awareness and know- ledge about waste disposal among people
in Nigeria but most of them are only aware of the crude and traditional
methods and are oblivious of the modern methods such as incineration and
recycling. The attitude of people towards waste management can be
affected by their level of knowledge and awareness of waste management
and it has been reported that homes with waste bins engage more in
proper way of storing waste than homes without waste bins. A Nigerian
study about attitude towards recycling and waste management showed no
significant effect of gender, employment and educational statuses, on
willingness to recycle.
Human wastes are great contributors of
environmental health hazards. Poor waste practices lead to contamination
of edible products thereby increasing the burden of infection and
diseases among the citizens. About 1.3 billion tons of waste are
generated globally, 0.035% being generated by Nigeria. About 85.8% of
Nigerian waste is generated by households. It is estimated that an
average Nigerian in the urban or rural areas generates about 0.49 kg of
solid waste per day with household and commercial centres contributing
almost 10% of total urban waste burden. Of this about two thirds of
wastes are dumped indiscriminately on the streets and in the drains thus
posing serious environmental health hazards.
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ABSRACT - [ Total Page(s): 1 ]Poor waste management has been a major problem to human existence and it affects both rural and urban areas. Various methods of waste disposal exist and this study assessed the waste man- agement practices among residents of Owerri State, Imo state, Nigeria. It was a descriptive cross sectional study in which a total of 282 residents of Owerri State were selected by multi- stage sampling technique and studied using self and interviewer administered questionnaires. The results showed that 90% of ... Continue reading---
