Municipal solid waste management is a growing problem in urban areas of Nepal where municipalities are severely constrained by budget to manage it effectively. Collecting fees from the public can aid finance for improving waste management service. This study evaluates willingness to pay (WTP) by 401 households, selected using a stratified sampling method from all 15 wards of Gorkha municipality of Nepal for improved waste collection service and the factors influencing it. We employed a contingent valuation method to elicit households' WTP, logit regression model to determine factors influencing WTP and tobit regression model to determine factors influencing the maximum amount households are willing to pay for improved waste collection service. Majority of households (61%) are willing to pay an average amount of NRs. 73.38 (0.72 US$) per month. Factors that significantly influence households' WTP are monthly household income, education of household head, environmental awareness and waste collection service. Except for education of household head, all these factors significantly influence the maximum amount of money households are willing to pay. Concerned stakeholders and policy makers should consider these traits of households before enforcing a waste collection fee.
Municipal solid waste is a growing concern in cities of developing countries and households are the main contributor. Lack of reliable data sources remain one of the major drawbacks for deciding on effective waste management option. The study area Gorkha municipality is selected because it is one of the highly under-researched and least resource intensive municipalities in Nepal. However, continued growth in municipal waste if left unattended will only intensify the problem and thus demands proactive action. Therefore, the objective of this study is to analyze waste composition and to evaluate the socioeconomic factors impacting household waste generation for effective management. Using stratified sampling method, 401 households were selected from all 15 municipal wards. Socioeconomic factors impacting household waste generation were assessed using Ordinary Least Square regression model. The rate of household waste generation in Gorkha municipality is found to be 0.24 kg/capita/day and estimated total household waste generation of 9.4 tonnes/day. Household size and income are found to have positive impact on waste generation, both statistically significant at 1% and thus can be important indicators to forecast solid waste generation trend. Household waste composition was 47.25% organic waste, 37.52% recyclable waste that comprised of 10.38% paper and paper products, 9.88% glass, 6.92% metal, 5.39% plastic, 3.57% textile and 1.38% rubber and leather, and rest 15.23% other waste. Organic waste has the highest share and if not managed properly, creates serious health and environmental hazards. It could be managed efficiently by composting at household and local government level.
Municipal solid waste management is a huge challenge specially in the developing countries. The first and fundamental step to solve the problem of municipal solid waste management is by waste segregation at source and separate collection of waste, which will help to recover recyclable materials and reduce the amount of waste that needs to be disposed at the dumpsite or landfill site. In Nepal, waste segregation at source is mandated by law but the government is not able to implement it successfully. This paper assesses the willingness of the households to practice waste segregation in future if the government enforces the law and various factors that influences the practice. Data was collected from 401 households which was selected using stratified sampling technique from all the municipal wards, the lowest administrative units in Nepal. The finding shows that about 67% of the respondents are willing to segregate waste in future if the government enforces the law. Logit regression model was employed to identify the factors that influence waste segregation practice. The significant variables found from this study are environmental awareness, waste collection service, willingness to pay, make compost, and segregated waste for a week variables, which are statistically significant at 1% level of significance. Income variable is significant at 5% level of significance and gender variable is significant at 10% level of significance. It is recommended that the concerned stakeholders should educate the households on the importance of waste segregation and consider these traits of households before enforcing the law.
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