Perceptions and Adoption of Sustainable Waste Management Practices in Selected Communities in Accra

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_37How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Accra-Ghana; community engagement; household waste management; public perception; recycling; sustainable practices; waste segregation

Abstract

Municipal solid waste management (MSWM) is a pertinent sustainability issue in African cities, including Accra, Ghana, where disposal is often informal, due to the high rate of urbanisation. The research analyses home-based waste management patterns and attitudes towards conceptualising sustainable home-based waste practices among various urban residents. The mixed-methods approach was applied with the help of quantitative surveys (N = 200; 100 Jamestown, 100 East Legon), qualitative focus group discussions (n = 4), and key interview informants (N = 6). Two Accra communities were chosen to compare socio-economically different societies. Great differences were identified. Segregation levels in East Legon were 45% and reliance on formal collection in East Legon was 80%, as compared to Jamestown, with lower levels of segregation (18%) and reliance on informal collection (45%). The most typical barriers were inconsistent collection, little knowledge of recycling, and financial issues. There was a high willingness to segregate (75–88 percent). The research has minimal community focus on generalisability. Further investigation ought to incorporate waste surveying and general growth. The results are consistent with site-specific waste measures: better infrastructure, regular collection, localised education, and low-cost models are essential. Waste management would be sustainable and thus boost the quality of life and livability of environments, improve people’s health, and provide local jobs through legalised recycling. The work presents primary, first-of-its-kind data that focuses on contrasting socio-economically diverse groups of people with some comparative data in one research study, thus constituting a solid evidence-based background on which contextualised and sustainable MSWM practices can be developed.

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - F. Osumanu
AU  - M. B. Arthur-Aidoo
AU  - E. B. Osei
AU  - S. N. O. Wellington
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/12/31
TI  - Perceptions and Adoption of Sustainable Waste Management Practices in Selected Communities in Accra
BT  - Proceedings of the International Conference on Engineering, Science, and Urban Sustainability (ICESUS 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 590
EP  - 611
SN  - 2352-5401
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_37
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6463-970-4_37
ID  - Osumanu2025
ER  -