Solid Waste Management in Poor Peri-Urban Communities- Case Study of Prampram Township

Solid waste management remains one of the biggest challenges to most Metropolitan, Municipal and District authorities in Ghana. Over the years Metropolitan, Municipal and District authorities have tried to curb the problems with solid waste without much success. This study seeks to assess the challenges and barriers affecting performance of technologies and practices used in solid waste management and propose sustainable solutions for improvement in Prampram township. The study adopted a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods to get deeper understanding of underlying issues of solid waste management in Prampram township. The qualitative methods included Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and in-depth interviews. Quantitative methods included household surveys, field measurements (physical characteristic;-solid waste composition, bulk density and generation rate) and GPS mapping. The solid waste generation was about 0.7kg/capita/day, with a bulk density of 270kg/m3. The daily estimated generation volume is 20.5m3 with a weight of about 5.5 tonnes. The composition of solid waste does not vary from other low income communities in Ghana, however varies in percentage; organics (21%), plastics (1.6%), cans (1.35%), Textiles (2.9%), Paper (2.5%), Human excreta (7.5%), glass bottles (0.6%) and miscellaneous (52%). The rather high miscellaneous (mostly sand mixed with ash, animals droppings etc) is attributable to the setting of the community. The rather low organic composition is attributable to the practice of feeding food (organic) waste to animals. Segregation practices and the activities of waste pickers and itinerants are prominent, particularly for economic earnings. Solid waste disposal practices in the communities include disposing of at communal container, burying on compound, dumping at un-authorised places and burning refuse in the vicinity of the compound. Improved disposal method is about 40% of the disposal practices. Only 27% of the solid waste generated in the community is collected to safe engineered disposal site at Kpone, 23km away from Prampram. The collection system is not accessible and has limited coverage or usage. The frequency of lifting of communal storage container is not prompt and the capacity of refuse storage is not adequate. Disposal places in the community pose environmental and public health threat. There is no cost recovery towards the disposal of the refuse and hence management system not financially sustainable. Challenges and barriers to performance include poor layout, economic status of the community, poor accessibility, institutional and organisational weakness and bad attitude towards waste management. Among the proposal for improvement is to establish buy-off point for recyclables, implement a block collection system, upgrade communal collection sites to sanitary transfer sites having bigger storage containers, resource Environmental Health Officers to undertake their responsibilities of ensuring proper solid waste management practices and educate and sensitise communities on waste reduction. It is concluded from this study that the performance of solid waste management in Prampram is poor and needs improvements. To ensure proper and sustainable solid waste management in the community, it is necessary to incorporate and encourage reduction, reuse and material recovery practices. It is also necessary to introduce cost recovery mechanism to sustain the management system. Public health and environmental sustainability is key to existence of life and therefore effectiveness of collection and safe disposal should be ensured.

Source: KNUST