According to Swedberg (2014), disposal is process of managing and getting rid of products that turn into trash or garbage. Wastes can be solid, liquid and gas. These wastes are disposed or managed in different ways like; some burn the wastes, some construct pit holes and dispose them in the pit holes, others dump the wastes in water resources.

The world has been affected by the poor waste disposal and management. Due to the problem, Chavez (2009) and Damian (2017) indicated waste generation rates are rising and in 2009 the world’s cities generated 2.01 billion tons of solid wastes, resulting to a footprint of 0.74 kg/person a day. The study adds that, with rapid population growth and urbanization, the annual waste generation is expected to increase by 75% from levels of 3.40 billion tons in 2050. Compared to those in developed nations, residents in developing countries especially the urban poor are more severely impacted by unsustainably managed wastes. In low-income countries, over 90% of waste is often disposed in unregulated dumps or openly burned, which results to serious health, safety and environmental problems. Poorly managed wastes serve as breeding ground of vectors, contributing to global climate change.

Khonje (2012) conducted a pilot study on the case of Malawi, more especially in the city of Lilongwe. The city is one of the largest cities in the country with a population of 670,000 growing at a rate of 4.3 per year. With the increase in population in Lilongwe, the rate of wastes also is increasing. A study done by the Monitoring and Evaluation Office of Community Servings (2010) indicates that the city generates 109 tons of solid wastes per day; a total of 15% is derived from industries, 25% from commercial areas, 20% from hospitals and 40% from residential areas. The study indicates that the city has been hit by a sanitation problem in both solid and liquid waste management. Waste disposal has also affected many Malawian urban communities around Lilongwe City. People of the communities also have their own ways of dumping wastes, for instance some use pit latrines and others dispose the wastes in water sources found in the communities like, streams, dams and roadsides.

Problem statement

Lilongwe as a capital city of Malawi is made up of the communities which are highly affected by poor waste disposal. People dump wastes without considering the health hazards, for instance, some dump the wastes in water sources. Wastes like diapers are commonly dumped in streams, swamps and rivers near the community. The end result of this improper waste disposal has led to the communities in the city being un-hygienic. People suffer from both water borne and vector borne diseases. These diseases make a lot of people fail to focus on productive activities which could help them generate income, since some are busy taking care of the patients suffering from these diseases whilst others are becoming victims of water and vector borne diseases. Therefore, the study aims at assessing roles of community members on community level waste disposal in Lilongwe City.

Overall objective

The overall objective of the study is to assess the roles of community members on community level waste disposal in Lilongwe City in Malawi.

Specific objectives

(a) To identify the causes of poor waste disposal in the communities of Lilongwe City.

(b) To assess the community perception towards poor waste disposal in Lilongwe City.

(c) To assess how poor wastes disposal affects the communities in Lilongwe City.

(d) To identify the roles of community members in mitigating the poor waste disposal in Lilongwe City

Causes of poor waste disposal in the community

Barre (2014) in her study titled ‘Waste Market in Urban Malawi’ indicated that most community members lack waste management skills. This is to say that most of the people in Malawian society do not know waste management skills such as reduce, reuse and recycle. For example, most of the plastic bottles are recyclable materials, but most people in Malawi do not have the skills on how they can recycle the bottles and, in the end, they throw the bottles irresponsibly, thereby putting more communities at risk due to improper management of the wastes.

A study done by the National Statistic Office of Republic of Malawi (2008), proved that since the overall level of waste production is positively correlated with the population of country, an increase in population automatically implies an increase in the amount of overall waste. There are official waste disposal sites that people may use to get rid of the large amounts of waste. However, there is a small but still significant amount of people who just dump their trash illegally in the woods and water sources. This problem is increasing with an increase in population since more waste is produced, and thus the probability for more waste dumping is likely to increase.

Most of the people avoid paying fees at waste management sites. Busa (2009) supports this claim more especially in cases of residents. In various parts of communities, disposing wastes illegally is on the rise. This habit is associated with the avoidance of paying disposal fees at waste management sites. The people who engage in such acts are of the opinion that the prevailing waste collection fees are excessive. Therefore, instead of following the rightful channels for disposing waste or paying third party waste pick up services, they illegally dispose the waste in remote locations. Some third-party waste pick-up services have also gotten into the habit of dumping waste on illegal dumpsites to avoid paying the disposal fees.

Busa (2009) suggested that poor waste disposal is caused by ignorance, where most people do not understand and are not very much aware of the consequences of poor dumping. Busa (2009) argued that regardless, some individuals simply do not see the need for recycling waste or follow the proper waste disposal channel and therefore go to highly unusual lengths to dispose waste illegally. Some people are simply too lazy to bring their trash to official dumping sites. A fraction of the society also does not care about the poor dumping problem and its consequences. They do so by completely avoiding prosecution and detection, which means that they do know the act, is unlawful. As a matter of fact, most of the items illegally disposed of, such as old appliances, white goods and furniture can be easily recycled or even reused. So, it can be suggested that most of the people engaging in acts of poor waste disposal simply do not understand the importance of reuse or the concept of recycling wastes.

Community’s perception towards poor waste disposal

Poor waste disposal is often regarded as a minor issue by many people; hence, Trevor (2017) concluded that this is due to social norms a particular community may possess. Humans are known to be influenced quite a lot by the people they mostly interact with. Some community members consider poor waste disposal as not a big deal or they actively contribute to it. They are also more likely to see it as an appropriate method of getting rid of trash. Thus, social norms and the behavior of close people play an essential role in how likely people are to accept or reject the idea of poor waste.

Neidell et al. (2019) argue that people in the community believe that dumping of wastes improperly is the only way of making the soil fertile. Carlsess (2007) also adds some people are of the idea that wastes make the soil fertile and large piles of wastes are dumped on land to make the soil fertile. On the same note, some are of the view that dumping wastes anyhow creates manure, hence, most of the community people dump wastes poorly to obtain large amount of manure more especially compost manure for their fields.

Lilongwe City Council (2015) is of the view that people believe that, it is the government’s duty to take care of the disposed wastes. They dispose wastes poorly hoping that the government will one day appear to clean up the large piles of wastes. For instance, this is the case with most Malawian urban markets where the market users dump large piles of wastes on land or on the dumping site, hoping that the government through the city council will come and clean up the mess.

Williams et al. (2017) in an article titled ‘Preliminary study of wastes management’ suggested that, people believe that waste disposal is something they do not have control over and that it is only nature that has control over the wastes, hence, they dispose wastes freely, believing that nature will do the controlling or the mitigation of the wastes for instance, the case with diapers. Many people dispose them in swamps, streams, rivers and wells because they believe managing them is out of their hands, so they leave it in the hands of nature to do the magic. That is why we see a lot of diapers in water sources waiting to be washed away by running rain water in the rainy season.

Effects of poor waste disposal at the community

Williams (2005) in his study titled ‘waste treatment and disposal’’ adds that soil contamination plays a bigger role in affecting the community. Ideally it is people’s desire that plastic, glass, metal and paper waste end up at a recycling facility. It then returns to the people as a renewable product. But the reality is entirely different. Contamination occurs by spilling and burying hazardous components in the soil. For example, when a plastic water bottle is incorrectly sent to a landfill, or left, at any other place, to be absorbed by the soil: plastic water bottles eventually break down to release a harmful component called, DIETHYLHYDROXYLAMINE (DEHA), a carcinogen which hurts the reproductive capabilities, causes liver dysfunction and weight loss issues. DEHA seeps into the surrounding areas of the soil and water bodies to harm the animal and plant life which depends on it. If the soil is contaminated with the DEHA component it means people’s farm lands will be affected too.

Moreover, water contamination has proved to have a significant effect to the community. Kaseva (2004) and Abdoli (2020) concluded that, when wastes are disposed into water bodies, they are often dissolved by the water bodies, which in turn end up forming poisonous substances that may be harmful to living organisms including humans. This is also harmful to people’s domestic activities especially those who use the water sources for cooking, washing and drinking. If the water is contaminated, the community can fail to use the water for domestic purposes.

Poor waste disposal impacts the climate in various ways. According to Beal (2012) and Brigham (2018), poor waste disposal disturbs the climate. When the wastes are disposed off improperly, they form harmful greenhouse gases which are created from decomposing waste. These rise up to the atmosphere and trap heat and adversely cause extreme weather reactions in the form of storms and typhoons. He also adds that the level of precipitation in the air can be destructed which in the end leads to acidic rains to severe hail storms and global warming.

According to Giusti (2009), poor waste disposal has an impact on human health. Salman (2021) states that when wastes are dumped everywhere either on land or water sources, this in turn creates a health hazard to people nearing the site where the wastes are dumped. For instance, wastes dumped in water sources can create a breeding ground for mosquitos and in the end, people living near the water source may suffer from malaria and other water borne diseases like cholera. Additionally, when people come in contact with waste, it causes skin irritation and blood infections. People also contract diseases from flies which are carriers of illnesses after breeding on solid waste.

Roles played by community members in mitigating poor waste disposal in the community

Although poor waste disposal brings negative impact to the community, there are still some roles which community members can take up to mitigate the problem. According to Blantyre City Council (2013), organizing activities based on community clean up days can help to mitigate poor waste disposal. Community leaders can mobilize volunteer groups for each clean-up initiative and organize special clean-up days in which all members of the community participate twice a year or more often if possible. The council also indicated that clean up days have proven to be a tremendous initiative in the sense that people take full responsibility of their community and to dump wastes poorly becomes difficult, clean up days help to save resources where government financial resources like money is saved, which could be used to employ people to clean up the wastes, but the coming in of community members to clean up their own community stops the burden of losing money by the government through the city councils.

The problem of poor waste disposal basically is the process which involves people committing the act, so to stop the act the community members also have responsibility in reporting of illegal dumping. Wilson (2007) argued that it is possible for people in all communities and societies to stand up against poor waste dumping. The people that engage in poor waste dumping activities do so knowingly and are always on the lookout for places where the environmental regulatory authorities hardly patrol. Hence, if people can take the responsibility of reporting any witnessed act of illegal dumping, it can impressively help in curbing the activity. This strategy should also work towards establishing a special task force that includes the environmental, health, police, and public works departments to work in cooperation with the local people.

Study by Anjum (2013), towards the mitigation of poor waste disposal, stated that wastes can be managed if the environmental authorities, together with the local community chiefs, set lower disposal fees to encourage people to use the lawfully stipulated waste disposal systems. At the same time, the relevant regulatory bodies against poor dumping must set higher fines to discourage the habit. This can be done by re-defining the fines and punishments for poor dumping as well as the licensing and charge rates for dumping services. For instance, it has been cited that in some areas, it may be less costly to illegally dump and pay a fine than using legitimate waste disposal channels. By employing this strategy, societies can become less vulnerable to poor dumping of wastes.

A report produced by UNEP (2015), suggested that members of the community should be in a position to embrace the practice of Reducing, Recycling, Reusing (The 3R). Alexis and Mihelcic (2009) note that poor waste dumping is a result of a high level of overall waste production. The amount of waste generated can be reduced, then the outcome will be fewer, and there will be fewer scenarios of poor dumping of wastes. All people should always strive to reduce the amount of waste they generate by only purchasing and using essential products. Also, the promotion of recycling initiatives such as the opening up of various designated areas for free collection of used and obsolete appliances, furniture and other home products for recycling can reduce poor dumping. The practice of reusing, such as donating or selling used products that are still in good condition, should as well be encouraged to cut back on poor disposal of appliances, white goods and furniture.

Setting lower disposal fees to encourage people use the lawfully stipulated waste disposal systems

The results in Figure 12 indicate that the highest number of respondents agreed to the statement, with 38% of the respondents agreeing. 23% of the respondents were not sure about the statement, 20% of the respondents strongly agreed to the statement and 19% of the respondents disagreed to the statement, 8% of the respondents strongly disagreed to the statement.

Holbrook (2011), indicated that most of the people dump wastes poorly because fees of garbage collectors are high and because the community members have no other means to dispose the wastes, they end up dumping wastes improperly, to be fair enough, it is imperative that these local garbage collectors set up lower disposal fees so that community members can have the chance to dispose the wastes to proper wastes management sites.

Embrace the practice of reduce, reuse and recycle waste                                         

In total, 67.5% strongly agreed, 22.5% agreed, 7.5% disagreed and 2.5% was not sure about the statement of embracing the practice of reducing, reusing and recycling (Table 10). It can be concluded that embracing the practice of reduce, reuse and recycle is indeed an effective way which community members can use in mitigating poor waste disposal. It is imperative that community members start to embrace these three practices for they have been proven to be effective practices, for instance; these practices help to save space for landfills. Carless (2007) suggested that, instead of dumping the wastes at dumping sites, the community members can reuse the wastes to make new other products for instance members can reuse the wastes to make briquettes, which in turn can also be helpful in saving the environment, plastic bags can also be reused, instead of dumping plastic bags, people can reuse them as shopping bags when going out for shopping. The results of objective four which is to identify the roles played by community members in mitigating poor waste disposal in the communities in Lilongwe City are summarized in Table 11.

The results give a clear indication that people can apply the statements and use them to mitigate poor waste disposal in the community, this is so because the response proves that more respondents were in favor of the statements. In the end, if applied, they can be effective ways in mitigating poor waste disposal.

The research found that indeed more community members have a role to play in mitigating poor waste disposal in the community, for example in objective four which has statements like: embrace the practice of reduce, reuse and recycle has given a clear indication that, the community members need to truly embrace this practice as one of their roles in mitigating poor waste disposal, so based on this statement, 67.5% of respondent strongly agreed to the statement and 22.5% of respondents agreed to the statement, which gives a clear indication that indeed community members should be encouraged to embrace the practice of reducing, reusing and recycling as one way of mitigating poor waste disposal in the community. The data that has been provided can be used for awareness campaigns, where by community members can be given an awareness on the impact of practicing poor waste disposal so that they can take up mindset change, on issues to deal with wastes. It is imperative to the community members that as they are being made aware of their roles, capacity building areas can also be easily identified through the community members. For instance, awareness can be a tool whereby they can easily identify the skills which community members have. Instead of practicing poor wastes disposal, community members can use the skills to make various goods out of the wastes. The results of the study have given a clear picture that community members of Lilongwe City have a bigger role to play in mitigating poor waste disposal in their community. It is crucial that people of this community work hand in hand with other stakeholders to ensure that every member fulfills the role of trying to improve the community, so that the problem of vector and water borne diseases can also be mitigated once and for all.

(1) Stakeholders should plan for waste management awareness programs.

(2) Community members should identify their capabilities to turn waste into briquettes which they can use for cooking and selling to generate income.

(3) Government should provide loans to the communities for small scale waste recycling businesses.

(4) Government should provide free waste collection services to some underprivileged urban communities.

The authors have not declared any conflict of interests.