The Challenge of Sustainable Waste Management
The Challenge of Sustainable Waste Management
The Challenge of Sustainable Waste Management
Waste is a global issue. If not properly dealt with, waste poses a threat to public health and the
environment. It
is a growing issue linked directly to the way society produces and consumes. It concerns everyone.
Waste management is one of the essential utility services underpinning society in the 21st century,
particularly
in urban areas. Waste management is a basic human need and can also be regarded as a basic human
right.
Ensuring proper sanitation and solid waste management sits alongside the provision of potable water,
shelter,
food, energy, transport and communications as essential to society and to the economy as a whole.
Despite
this, the public and political profile of waste management is often lower than other utility services.
Unfortunately, the consequences of doing little or even nothing to address waste management can be
very costly to society and to the economy overall. In the absence of waste regulations and their rigorous
implementation and enforcement, a generator of waste will tend to opt for the cheapest available course
of action. For example, household solid waste may be dumped in the street, on vacant land, or into
drains,
streams or other watercourses, or it may be burned to lessen the nuisance of accumulated piles of
waste.
Public health: Not having a solid waste collection service has a direct health
impact on residents, particularly children. The uncontrolled burning of waste
creates particulate and persistent organic pollutant emissions that are highly
damaging locally and globally. Accumulated waste and blocked drains
encourage vectors to breed, resulting in the spread of cholera, dengue fever
and other infectious diseases and are a major contributing factor to flooding.
Uncontrolled dumpsites, and in particular the mixing of hazardous and other
wastes, can cause disease in neighbouring settlements as well as among
waste workers. Box 1.1 presents selected case studies illustrating both the
public health problems of uncollected waste as well as the solutions.1
On a larger scale, when significant quantities of municipal or industrial solid waste are dumped or
burned in the
open, the adverse impacts on air, surface and groundwater, soil and the coastal and marine
environment, and
thus indirectly on public health, can be severe.
Environmental pollution: Dumpsites on land can pollute both surface and groundwater. These sites are
often alongside rivers or the sea, and therefore may directly pollute them as well as the coastal
environment.
Coastal dumpsite erosion is one source of marine litter. Other potential damage costs include losses
resulting from decreases in tourism due to polluted beaches and losses incurred through damage to
fisheries. Former dumpsites, particularly those that have received hazardous waste, are a major category
of contaminated site. Box 1.2 presents selected case studies illustrating both the environmental impacts
of uncontrolled disposal and also environmentally sound management.2
By definition, uncontrolled waste is not managed and thus not measured, making it difficult to estimate
either the size of the problem or the scale of the associated costs. However, the evidence suggests that
in a
middle- or low-income city, the costs to society and the economy are perhaps 5-10 times what sound
solid
waste management (SWM) would cost per capita. It is dramatically cheaper to manage waste now in an
environmentally sound manner than to clean up in future years the sins of the past.
This Global Waste Management Outlook (GWMO)
aims to make the case that sound waste management
is much more than merely desirable. Sound waste
management is absolutely essential.
Trad
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ameaa sade pblica e ao meio ambiente. isto
uma questo crescente ligada diretamente forma como a sociedade produz e consome. Isso diz
respeito a todos.
A gesto de resduos um dos servios essenciais de servios pblicos que sustentam a sociedade no
sculo XXI, em particular
Em reas urbanas. A gesto de resduos uma necessidade humana bsica e tambm pode ser
considerada como um "direito humano bsico".
Assegurar o saneamento adequado e o gerenciamento de resduos slidos fica ao lado do fornecimento
de gua potvel, abrigo,
Alimentos, energia, transportes e comunicaes como essenciais para a sociedade e para a economia
como um todo. Apesar de
Isto, o perfil pblico e poltico da gesto de resduos muitas vezes menor do que outros servios de
utilidade.
Infelizmente, as conseqncias de fazer pouco ou mesmo nada para abordar o gerenciamento de
resduos podem ser
Muito caro para a sociedade e para a economia em geral. Na ausncia de regulamentos de resduos e
seus rigorosos
Implementao e execuo, um gerador de resduos tender a optar pelo curso mais barato disponvel
de ao. Por exemplo, os resduos slidos domsticos podem ser despejados na rua, em terrenos vagos
ou em drenos,
Crregos ou outros cursos de gua, ou pode ser queimado para diminuir o incmodo das pilhas
acumuladas de resduos.
Sade pblica: no ter um servio de coleta de lixo slido tem uma sade direta
Impacto sobre residentes, particularmente crianas. A queima incontrolada de resduos
Cria emisses particuladas e persistentes de poluentes orgnicos que so altamente
Prejudiciais localmente e globalmente. Resduos acumulados e esgotos bloqueados
Incentivar vetores para raa, resultando na propagao da clera, dengue
E outras doenas infecciosas e so um dos principais fatores que contribuem para as inundaes.
Dumpsites no controlados e, em particular, a mistura de substncias perigosas e outras
Resduos, podem causar doenas em assentamentos vizinhos, bem como entre
Resduos de trabalhadores. A caixa 1.1 apresenta estudos de caso selecionados que ilustram tanto o
Problemas de sade pblica dos resduos no cobrados, bem como as solues.1
Em grande escala, quando quantidades significativas de resduos slidos municipais ou industriais so
despejados ou queimados no
Aberto, os impactos adversos sobre o ar, as guas superficiais e subterrneas, o solo e o meio ambiente
costeiro e marinho, e
Assim indiretamente na sade pblica, pode ser grave.
Poluio ambiental: os despejos em terra podem poluir as guas superficiais e subterrneas. Esses sites
so
Muitas vezes ao lado dos rios ou do mar, e, portanto, pode polu-los diretamente, bem como o ambiente
costeiro.
A eroso do lixo costeiro uma fonte de lixo marinho. Outros custos de danos potenciais incluem perdas
Resultantes da diminuio do turismo devido a praias poludas e perdas incorridas por danos causados
Pesca. Os antigos despejos, particularmente aqueles que receberam resduos perigosos, so uma
categoria importante
De site contaminado. A caixa 1.2 apresenta estudos de caso selecionados que ilustram tanto os impactos
ambientais
De descarte descontrolado e tambm de gerenciamento ambientalmente saudvel.2
Por definio, o desperdcio no controlado no "gerenciado" e, portanto, no medido, dificultando a
estimativa
Seja o tamanho do problema ou a escala dos custos associados. No entanto, a evidncia sugere que, em
um
Cidade de renda mdia ou baixa, os custos para a sociedade e a economia so talvez 5-10 vezes o que
parece slido
Gesto de resduos (SWM) custaria per capita. dramaticamente mais barato administrar resduos agora
em um
Maneira ambientalmente saudvel do que limpar nos anos futuros "pecados do passado".
Este Global Waste Management Outlook (GWMO)
Visa tornar o caso de gesto de resduos slida
muito mais do que meramente desejvel. Desperdcio sonoro
A gesto absolutamente essencial.
MOVING FROM WASTE MANAGEMENT TO RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
Many developed countries have made great strides in addressing waste management, particularly since
the
environment came onto the international agenda in the 1960s, and there are many good practice
examples
available for the international community to learn from. However, the initial focus was on waste after it
had been
discarded, whereas at present attention has moved upstream, addressing the problem at its source
through,
for example, designing out waste, preventing its generation, reducing both the quantities and the uses of
hazardous substances, minimizing and reusing, and, where residuals do occur, keeping them
concentrated
and separate to preserve their intrinsic value for recycling and recovery and prevent them from
contaminating
other waste that still has economic value for recovery. The goal is to move the fundamental thinking
away from
waste disposal to waste management and from waste to resources hence the updated
terminology
waste and resource management and resource management, as part of the circular economy.19 In
this
regard, the GWMO interfaces with the earlier Global Outlook on Sustainable Consumption and
Production
(SCP) policies.20
Low- and middle-income countries still face major challenges in ensuring universal access to waste
collection services, eliminating uncontrolled disposal and burning and moving towards environmentally
sound
management for all waste. Achieving this challenge is made even more difficult by forecasts that major
cities
in the lowest income countries are likely to double in population over the next 20 or so years, which is
also
likely to increase the local political priority given to waste issues. Low- and middle-income countries
need to
devise and implement innovative and effective policies and practices to promote waste prevention and
stem
the relentless increase in waste per capita as economies develop.