Toward a Sustainable Municipal Solid Waste Management: Gaps and Challenges in Africa

Abstract This paper comprehensively evaluates the status of municipal solid waste (MSW) management in 54 African countries, with particular attention on MSW generation, collection, disposal, and related legislations from economical and geographical perspectives. By non-spatial data analysis model, the controlling factors that affect the daily MSW generation per capita are determined. The results show the heterogeneity of daily per capita MSW generation across African countries, ranging from 0.1 kg to 1.49 kg in 2016, largely affected by income level, national laws, geographical location and frequency of collection, particularly by GDP per capita and legislation system. The higher MSW generation, collection rates and disposal rate often occurred in economically developed maritime countries. In addition, the wide gap of MSW collection rate not only existed between African countries, but also existed within a country, even in a city, especially for low-income and middle-income countries. Moreover, there was a lack of solid waste regulations in majority Africa countries, and they are poorly implemented while where there are regulations. Based on MSW generation prediction model, the total MSW generation in Africa is expected to triple in 2050, making the future of solid waste management in Africa more challenging.