Question

QUESTION ONE: CASE STUDY

Title: Municipal Solid Waste Management in the Kanzo Metropolitan Area, Sikaman

Kanzo is a metropolitan area in Sikaman, a least developed country in West Africa, which has experienced rapid

urbanisation over the past six decades. The population of Kanzo in 1965 was 45,000, which tripled in two

decades, and further reached 1.2 million in the year 2005. The National Development Planning Council

(NDPC), headquartered in Kanzo has estimated that the city’s population surpassed the threshold of 5 million

in 2019. City authorities have become worried, considering the current rate of urbanisation pegged at 3 percent

per annum. The population growth coupled with the rapid expansion of the city has resulted in an urban sprawl

and uncontrolled expansion from the adjourning municipalities. Also, there has been an increased crowding

resulting in higher occupancy ratios in existing housing units, and the infilling of vacant plots in existing

residential areas. According to the NDPC, over 70 percent of the population of Kanzo live in low income, high

density population areas which account for many of the slums in the city and its peripheral environs.

Kanzo generates over 3,000 tons of solid waste per day and only about 60 percent is collected by the waste

management organisations contracted through a public private partnership (PPP) arrangement. Of these, the

organic waste, made up of kitchen waste including food leftovers, rotten fruits, vegetables, leaves, crop residues,

animal excreta and bones constitute 65-70% whiles industrial waste made up of plastics, glass, metals, and paper

account for the remaining 30-35%. The high organic and moisture contents left in the open at prevailing high

temperatures require frequent removals, which place additional burden on an over strained collection system.

Experts have warned that the delays and inefficiencies in the solid waste collection system in Kanzo, is what

has accounted for the high incidence of cholera, typhoid fever, malaria, and other health hazards witnessed in

the metropolis. Especially in low income areas where the waste is not segregated but mixed due to inadequate

sanitation facilities, the problem becomes more compounded.

The lack of proper land use planning in Kanzo, also hinders effective sanitation and waste management

practices. As reported in the April 9, 2019 edition of the Daily Mail Newspaper, the lack of comprehensive

planning, the absence of planning controls, week enforcement of bye-laws, indiscipline, difficulty to apply

service charges, limited number of waste management organisations, and the lack of an adequate and well

maintained infrastructure in the urban, and industrial development processes is responsible Kanzo’s

environmental problems. The publication further outlines that the poor layouts, untarred and narrow nature of

the road networks particularly in slums, make it difficult for waste collection vehicles to reach some parts of the

city compound the situation. This uncontrolled urbanisation has resulted in an increase in the average travel

distance to be covered by collection vehicles and additional cost to waste management.

In January, 2020, resident associations from all sub-metropolitan areas of Kanzo staged a mammoth

demonstration at the city centre and presented a petition to the Office of the Mayor of Kanzo, Dr. E.M Hygiene,

to express their concerns on the unsustainable manner and poor solid waste management system, as well as the

environmental risks associated with the practice.

REQUIRED:

i. Identify any four (4) major causes of the poor solid waste management and sanitation problems

confronting the Kanzo Metropolitan Area.

ii. Discuss any three (3) environmental risks which the poor solid waste management practices may pose

to residents of Kanzo and suggest what the residents can do to help solve the problem.

iii. From the above case, use your knowledge in waste management to recommend three (3) sustainable

ways by which the City Authorities can solve this problem.

Answer 1