Analysis of Waste Management and Environmental Sustainability Issues

This essay delves into the multifaceted issue of waste management and its impact on environmental sustainability. It begins by highlighting the critical importance of waste management in the context of a rapidly growing global population, urbanization, and increasing resource consumption. The essay underscores the staggering amount of waste generated worldwide and emphasizes the urgent need for effective waste management systems. The research explores both the scientific and ethical dimensions of waste management. It reviews literature from the World Bank and other scholarly sources to understand the magnitude of the problem, including waste types (biodegradable and non-biodegradable), and the challenges posed by chemical waste. The essay examines the scientific aspects, focusing on the waste hierarchy (reduce, reuse, recycle) and the ethical dimensions, including the Polluters-Pay Principle and the need for ethical behavior in resource consumption and waste disposal. The essay concludes by advocating for a holistic approach to waste management, recognizing it as a significant contributor to sustainable development.

Running head: WASTE MANAGEMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY
Waste Management and Environmental Sustainability
Student’s name
University
Author’s note

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Introduction
The welfare and development of the human society depends to a great extent on the
collective cooperation and contribution of the human kind. However, due to a rapidly growing
population, urbanization and subsequent increase of resource consumption, the issue of
sustainability has become the central challenge to the human race. Amidst numerous perils that
the environment is facing today, waste management have become one of the most crucial factor
that affects the environmental sustainability. The United States alone is responsible for
producing a staggering 220 million tons of waste per year, whereas the overall global rate of
waste generation is estimated at over 2 billion tons per year (un.org, 2016). A World Bank report
on waste generation and management suggests that till 2016, the global waste footprint has
reached 0.74 kilogram per person per day, which is likely to increase by an alarming 70% by
2050 (worldbank.org, 2019). Given the urgency and effect of the issue, almost all the national
governments, as well as several international agencies and organizations have taken up the
challenge to mitigate the negative impact of waste generation by curbing the amount of waste
disposal as well as implementing an effective waste management system. However, the general
population, comprised mainly of urban poor and middle class, as well as industries of various
size and strength are yet to comply with the regulations of sustainable waste management.
Existing research shows that the biggest challenge in the course of waste management
remains as the inability of the concerned authorities to cope with the amount of waste generated,
and to consequentially restrain the negative effects of waste related pollution on environment and
public health. In the light of this pertinent barriers in the field of waste management, the present
research hypothesizes that a collective cooperation and contribution will help improve the
situation of waste management to achieve environmental sustainability. To this end, the research

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attempts to explore the scientific and ethical dimensions of waste management in order to come
up with novel strategies to involve the concerned stakeholders by persuading them with the
understanding of scientific and ethical dimensions of waste generation and subsequent
management practices.
Literature Review
In order to understand the magnitude of the problem, the present study took support from
the World Bank brief on solid waste management as published in 2019. The report is published
by a renowned international agency working on pertinent global issues and contributed by
authentic, learned scholars and researchers from 170 countries of the world. It is an extremely
accountable and transparent organisation. Working over 189 locations worldwide, the
organisation publishes regular periodicals and research briefs to support its workers with updated
information about various sustainability and other global issues. The present report being one of
of such briefs is nonetheless reliable.
The brief describes waste as the unusable and unrecyclable amount of discarded
substances. However, the present amount of solid waste around the world is not comprised of
unrecyclable or unusable substances alone. There is a large volume of discarded materials that
can be reused or recycled if treated in an efficient manner (worldbank.org, 2019).
Another scholarly resource that informs about the specific details of waste management is
the book Basic Hazardous Waste Management by Blackman Jr. (2016). Published by the CRC
Press, the book claims to be developed with information obtained from highly regarded and
authentic sources, and all the sources are duly cited. The publication carries an ISBN as well,
which makes it reliable and authentic scholarly source.

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As suggested by Blackman Jr. (2016), the primary sources of waste generation are
domestic, agricultural, commercial and industrial; whereas there are two main types of waste, i.e.
biodegradable and non-biodegradable. These two types of waste are also known as wet waste
and dry waste respectively. The biodegradable waste can be easily managed as they can
decompose and will be assimilated in nature. However, the major challenge in the context of
waste management lies with the dry waste or non-biodegradable waste, since such waste
materials are likely to accumulate and create a burden for the environment. Such form of waste
requires special care and treatment in terms of monitoring, collection and treatment to recycle the
reusable part and disposal of the remaining unusable part. Chemical waste is another crucial
element in the context of harmful waste, as it can amount to be hazardous. Chemical wastes are
majorly generated through industrial operations, although several urban activities, such as
transportation, leisure, hospitality, healthcare etc. can produce significant amount of chemical
waste. Such waste are considered as extremely harmful for both the environment as well as the
general health of the surrounding population, as it shows hazardous characteristics such as
corrosivity, toxicity, reactivity, ignitability etc (Blackman Jr. 2016).
Another source used for understanding the current global state of waste management is
developed by L Rodić and DC Wilson (2017). It is a peer-reviewed article published in the
journal of Sustainability, which belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Development of
Sanitation, Water Supply and Solid Waste in Low-and Middle Income Settings. The authors are
reliable and authentic scholars themselves, Wilson being attached with Imperial College London.
Rodić and Wilson (2017) suggest that the process of waste management differs from
country to country, and region to region, given the diverse nature of waste. As the current data
suggests, developing countries are yet to catch up with the contemporary practices of waste

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management due to insufficiency of funds, resources and technologies as compared to the
developed countries. Irrespective of the manner in which waste is collected or treated across the
regions, it is imperative to manage the waste disposal efficiently, for untreated waste pose major
threat to the environment as well as human health, amounting to serious pollution, acid rain,
damage of ecology and harvest etc. (Rodić and Wilson 2017).
The urban poor are the most likely to be affected by the ill-managed waste disposal and
treatment. Nevertheless, the negative impact of waste disposal affects the entire ecosystem in the
long run. The UNEP reports that the major chunk of municipal budget is currently being invested
in waste management. It is one of the most complex and cost-intensive public service. (un.org
2016) However, the international agency acknowledges that waste management has immense
potential to convert crises into solutions. Leading towards the achievement of sustainable
development. Recycling one ton of aluminium or paper reduces 10000 kilograms of carbon
dioxide in the environment. Similarly, a 2009 report by the same agency shows that there is 65
times more amount of gold in one ton old recycled mobile phones than same amount of gold ore
(un.org 2016). Hence, the current investment in effective waste management could prove
beneficial in terms of future returns, enabling the forthcoming generation to live in a healthy
environment, as well as achieving environmental sustainability.
To this end, the present study attempts to formulate an effective strategy that may bring
out positive practices in waste management. Hence, it further investigates two peer-reviewed
articles, one examining the scientific aspect, and the other exploring the ethical aspect of the
issue, to integrate the findings and come up with a novel framework.

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Scientific Dimension of Waste Management
The study builds on the findings of the article Limitations of the waste hierarchy for
achieving absolute reductions in material throughpu for comprehending the scientific aspects of
waste management. The said article is a peer-reviewed, scientific source published by Elsevier,
one of the most recognized and authentic publishers in the contemporary academia.
The authors, Van Ewijk and Stegemann (2016), point to the rapid industrialization,
urbanization and unmonitored development projects across the world to attribute the
responsibility of increasing the amount of waste with each passing day. The authors hold that it
is high time to employ effective measures to manage waste instead of simply sending them to
landfills or incarceration, as both the methods entail corollary negative impact on the
environment. Hence, the most scientific method of waste management is embedded in the
principle of waste hierarchy, referring to the three R’s—reuse, reduce and recycle.
The underlying aim of waste hierarchy is to achieve waste minimization and extract the
optimum amount of practical benefit of resources and manufactured products. In this context, it
is essential to consider the resource aspect of efficiency, which indicates that at the current rate,
the amount of resource will not sustain for long. It is observed in the global context that humans
are now producing and consuming more products than the planet could replenish. Thus, by
reusing and recycling, the balance of existing resource can be maintained, ensuring an equitable
distribution of resources for the future generations.
Ethical Dimension of Waste Management
For building on the ethical aspect of waste management, the study seeks help from the
peer-reviewed article Waste and Waste Management by Joshua Reno (2016). It is published in

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the Annual Review of Anthropology, a globally acknowledged resource for anthropological
resources and written by Joshua Reno, who is attached with the Department of Anthropology,
Binghamton University, The State University of New York.
According to Reno (2016), the effectiveness of the scientific method of three R’s is
limited by the perceived non-cooperation of associated stakeholders in the society. The major
shortcoming of the recycling approach is the perceived reluctance of the consumers. If the
overconsumption and overproduction are not arrested with immediate effect, mere recycling
cannot withstand the resource depletion. With the global advent of consumerism and commodity
culture, the majority of the urban population has turned into a throw-away society, indicating to
the trends of excessive production of disposable products as well as alarming rates of
overconsumption (Reno 2015).
The evidence of such throw-away culture is commonplace now. Packaging waste, food
waste, fast fashion, as well as lifestyle commodities are some of the examples in the
contemporary urban culture that increases the total amount of reusable, yet disposed waste. To
curb this malpractice, an effective strategy of waste management should also address the ethical
behavior of human beings in terms of resource consumption and waste disposal.
It is interesting to note that the entire amount of waste across the world is generated by
human activities alone. Hence, the responsibility of reducing the negative impact of waste
generation and disposal has to be borne by the human race collectively (OECD-NEA, 2019).
This particular ethical viewpoint is fortified by the Polluters-Pay Principle, which suggests that
the one who is responsible for pollution should bear the cost of managing its negative impact, so
that it does not affect the environment or human health (Schwartz 2018). This view is informed
by the PPP theory as presented by Priscilla Schwartz in the book of Elgar Encyclopedia of

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Environmental Law. This is a renowned scholarly source for environmental studies, edited by
Michael Faure, a globally renowned author on Law and Economics. Also, it carries an ISBN
making it undoubtedly authentic and credible resource.
Beside the Polluters pay principle, it is also regarded that waste should be managed in a
way that ensures safety and security of the surrounding ecology as well as the future generations.
In this regard, the national as well as international authorities have developed several regulations
and legislations to control the human activity that leads to pollution, misuse of resource,
damaging the environment. Regulations such as carbon tax, mandatory waste management
protocol etc. posit the liability of ethical treatment of environment on the responsible entity.
However, as mentioned earlier, there is a perceived reluctance in complying with these
regulations. Hence, the ethical framework requires a revision to be employed effectively.
To understand the probable approach towards waste management in a global scale, the
essay thereby looks into the Global Waste Management Outlook published by UNEP (Wilson et
al. 2015). The document establishes the rationale and the tools for taking a holistic approach
towards waste management and recognizing waste and resource management as a significant
contributor to sustainable development and climate change mitigation. Hence, the present study
proposes that the mitigating strategy for managing waste across the world can be developed by
integrating the scientific and ethical aspects of waste management, developing an ethical attitude
towards the scientific practices for managing waste and imparting such knowledge through
rudimentary education to ensure a global change.

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Recommendation and Conclusion
The aforementioned discussion points to the scientific as well as ethical frameworks of
effective waste management, explaining the Three R’s and the issue of overconsumption and
liability principle. However, the analysis points to the inherent limitations of the particular
frameworks. To this end, the present paper proposes to incorporate the aspect of collective
cooperation and contribution to the existing models, and present a novel strategy integrating
them. The issue of overconsumption or liability cannot be regulated by mechanical legislations,
unless and until the entities concerned realize the urgency of the matter. On the other hand, reuse
and recycling cannot sustain the natural resource unless overconsumption is arrested. In this
sense, these approaches are interlinked. Additionally, social inclusion as well as global
collaboration can be key to promote a functional waste management system.
At a fundamental level, behaviour change is imperative to achieve a sustainable future.
Awareness systems and incentive structures can be devised to ensure such change of attitude.
Moreover, promoting Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in rudimentary level of
school education can bring out such change in public attitude (Hedefalk, Almqvist and Östman
2015). Besides, Public-Private Partnerships for Service Delivery (PPPSD) can be instrumental to
promote collaboration between industries and local governments (worldbank.org 2019).
Technology transfer and knowledge sharing between developed and developing nations can
overcome the shortcoming in waste management system in poor economies.
Thus, the study concludes that collective contribution and collaboration at a global scale
can bring about a positive change in the existing waste management system, ensuring a
sustainable future.

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References
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<https://www.oecd-nea.org/rwm/reports/1995/geodisp/ethical-environmental-
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Reno, J., 2015. Waste and waste management. Annual Review of Anthropology, 44, pp.557-572.

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Rodić, L. and Wilson, D.C., 2017. Resolving governance issues to achieve priority sustainable
development goals related to solid waste management in developing countries. Sustainability,
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