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Waste


 
Waste refers to unwanted or unusable materials. But under the right conditions, what is waste for one person, can be a source of income for others. At Practical Action we use people-centred approaches to support highly vulnerable informal waste workers, tackle the growing urban waste crisis, and promote more sustainable, circular patterns of production and consumption.

Managing Waste – the issues

Dealing with the waste we all generate is a growing global challenge. Some issues with waste are common around the world; including waste of products like leaving unsold or unwanted food to rot, or sending waste to landfill when it could be recycled, composted or re-used. However, as with climate change, often the people who contribute the least to these issues are the ones whose lives are most impacted by them.

2.7 billion people live without any kind of waste collection services, and in sub-Saharan Africa, 87% (79% in Central and South Asia) of municipal solid waste is openly dumped or burned.

We’re also working in a context where conventional approaches concentrate on material flows, environmental impacts, and hard infrastructure Yet this is a human problem with major social, health, and economic impacts, felt most acutely by some of the world’s poorest people.

These waste management issues mean that:

  • Waste workers (especially informal waste workers) often face hazardous working conditions, harassment and discrimination, and are unrecognised and undervalued. Women often face additional risks.
  • Health is impacted, as waste dumps enable disease to spread
  • The Environment is degraded, with land, water and air pollution damaging local natural resources
  • Living conditions are affected, with people living surrounded by uncollected waste in their communities, and smells can be terrible
  • Climate change is exacerbated, as waste dumps are the third largest emitter of global methane, and burning waste emits powerful greenhouse gases and smoke particles which accelerate climate change

The situation is only set to get worse as urban populations grow, with an escalated volume of waste in low and middle-income countries forecasted. For example, in sub-Saharan Africa, municipal waste generation is predicted to triple from current levels by 2050.

The global waste issue is clear, but there’s an opportunity to tackle it through prevention, reuse, recycling, and ensuring that people are always at the centre of the solutions that we work together to put into place.

Managing our waste better – the opportunity

By taking a people-centered approach to managing our waste, great improvements can be made both at home, and in the places around the world where waste makes life much more difficult.

We can all seek to cut down on our personal household waste. For example in countries like the UK that can include, observing the 6 Rs (Rethink, Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Repair), avoiding food waste through planning and composting, cutting down our water footprints by taking shorter showers, separating and recycling our waste at home, finding new homes for our unwanted items, and buying things second hand where possible.

Across the world, larger-scale initiatives are necessary. Collective action is needed to deal with issues like discarded plastic polluting our waterways and ending up in the ocean; the additional expense and reduced value caused by waste not being separated before collection; or the pollution caused by open burning of waste. Informal waste workers often have huge experience and knowledge of recycling markets, but need support to come together in co-operatives or associations, to negotiate for the right to operate and for safer working conditions, and to be integrated with formal systems. Policies and finance matter too, with for example the inclusion of Extended Producer Responsibility rules meaning companies are required to make a contribution to dealing with the waste their products generate.

We are proposing four pillars of a people-centred approach:
1. Reaching everyone with the waste services they need
2. Tackling the waste that affects people the most
3. Improving the lives and working conditions of informal waste workers
4. Integrating the voice of those most affected in local and national decision-making

These are the kinds of projects that Practical Action gets involved with. We’re making cities in developing countries cleaner, healthier, fairer places for people to live and work. We work with communities, municipalities and companies to deliver sustainable, equitable waste management services. Together we’re protecting the health, safety and dignity of poorly paid waste workers, and improving the environment for both people and nature.

Watch more about our approach to managing waste.