ABSTRACT
The concept of sustainable or integrated waste management, aimed at providing the correct incentives for waste disposal, has been gaining increased attention among the developed nations since the mid-1980s. Recognition of the issues relating to waste has heightened as a result of often monotonically increasing waste levels, scarcity of land for landfill development in certain regions, and increasing public opposition, expressed in terms of the ‘not in my back yard’ (NIMBY) phenomenon, to landfill and incinerator siting. This has resulted in an increase in the theoretical and empirical literature devoted to efficient waste management and waste policy. Most studies have focused on theoretical models or empirical analyses at
household or community level. There are some extensive surveys of this literature (Kinnamon and Fullerton 1999), thus we do not offer a review in this chapter except to observe that only Beede and Bloome (1995) and Johnstone and Labonne (2004) examine the generation of municipal solid waste (MSW) at the country or macro-economic, level. The aim of this chapter is to add to this strand of the literature by examining the determinants of MSW generation, and its disposal and recycling, at the macro-economic level. Using cross-sectional time series data from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries for the period 1980-2000, this chapter provides a systematic analysis of the determinants of MSW generation before examining the underlying factors that determine the way MSW is managed. Specifically it examines: (i) the proportion of MSW that is disposed of in landfill; (ii) the proportion of paper and cardboard that is recycled as a percentage of apparent consumption; and (iii) the proportion of glass that is recycled as a percentage of apparent consumption. In addition to economic and demographic variables, two policy variables are included in the analysis, namely a waste legislation and policy index, and the level of landfill taxes that have been introduced in a number of countries. The results provide important insights into the nature of future waste trends and the effect that public policy may have on them.
