Public Awareness Is Key to Successful Waste Management

Abstract

A critical component in any waste management program is public awareness and participation, in addition to appropriate legislation, strong technical support, and adequate funding. Waste is the result of human activities and everyone needs to have a proper understanding of waste management issues, without which the success of even the best conceived waste management plan becomes questionable. The paper presents an overview of the fundamentals of waste management and, using examples from the United States, illustrates how public awareness and participation results in succcssful waste management. Examples of the methods and techniques that have been very effective in creating and enhancing public awareness of waste management problems, including the author's proven method of public education, are presented in the paper. The details of a course aimed at educating school teachers on waste management issues and a specialized curriculum on waste and litter control, designed for kindergarten through 8th grade students and developed by the author, are discussed in the paper. A case study dealing with remediation of one of the worst contaminated hazardous waste sites in the United States, that included substantial public participation, is reviewed. The paper concludes by emphasizing that the public must be made aware of waste management issues to understand the consequences of improper management of waste and how it may ultimately pose a serious threat to their lives and well-being.

Enhanced solid waste management by understanding the effects of gender, income, marital status, and religious convictions on attitudes and practices related to street littering in Nablus – Palestinian territory

“…Other causes also include poor packaging design of commercial products, amount of litter already present at a particular site, presence and wording of signs referring to litter, and the number and/or placement and appearance of waste collection bins at the site (Kapoor, 2001;Somerville et al, 2003;Hasan, 2004;Gray and Gray, 2004;Santos et al, 2005a). Similarly, an array of socio-economic factors can affect public attitude towards littering, frequency of littering, and the effective approaches to hinder the littering tendency within an individual (Willoughby et al, 1997;Santos et al, 2005b;Liu and Sibley, 2004;Arafat et al, 2007;Storrier and McGlashan, 2006).…”

A Proposed Technology Solution for Preventing Marine Littering Based on Uavs and Iot Cloud-Based Data Analytics

“…Although the clean-up of the sea is imperative, the International Conferences ICT, Society, and Human Beings 2019; Connected Smart Cities 2019; and Web Based Communities and Social Media 2019 prevention of marine littering from debris entering the sea, remains the top priority. However, the lack of public awareness related to marine littering and best practices for waste disposal exacerbates the situation (Hasan, 2004). Unfortunately, up to today current efforts seem inadequate and inefficient since they are traditionally limited to high cost campaigns to raise awareness on marine littering and responsible citizenship.…”

A look inside the garbage can: assessing the sustainability and waste management efforts in the 2015 Prince George Canada Winter Games

“…To be successful in enforcing waste diversion efforts, awareness and education is critical. The most critical groups to target are school aged children that will grow up with a culture of recycling (Hasan, 2004). In most places, the management authority for waste is the local municipality which suggests that waste separation/ recycling strategies could vary from one municipality to another; even neighbouring municipalities can be unique (Bolaane, 2006).…”

“…In some cases, it has been effective to use educational institutions as tools for encouraging and educating children and the public on waste management (Hasan, 2004;Jibril, 2012). Targeting children for education on these issues leads to life-long environmental awareness (Hasan, 2006).…”

“…Targeting children for education on these issues leads to life-long environmental awareness (Hasan, 2006). However, educational institutions play a larger role than just at the primary level, higher education institutions (HEI) are viewed as the leaders in environmentalism (Hasan, 2004;Jibril, 2012). In many cases, HEIs are viewed as the progressive, driving forces in change including integrated solid waste management (Jibril, 2012).…”