Residential Density and Illegal Waste Dumping In Cities

Background and Objectives: For developing countries in general and for Sub-Sahara Africa in particular, little is documented in the lit- erature about the location and size of illegal waste dumps in relation to urban residential areas and how this may introduce an alternative explanation for the prevalence of illegal waste dumping using Hara- re, Zimbabwe as a study area. The objectives were to characterize waste in the context of class, volume, source and distance, to anal- yse location and waste volume in relation to residential areas and, to generate management lessons for Sub-Sahara Africa. Methods: Primary data was collected through field observation and measurement was input into multiple linear regression and correla- tion using the SPSS™ programme. Tests for normal distribution and for multicollinearity were carried on a set of predictor variables on size and location attributes, waste collection service, residential housing density, waste volumes and disposal practices. Finding: The results indicate a concentration of illegal waste dumps in low-income high density residential districts, an adjusted R2=0.186 and, a 2-tailed p-value at alpha 0.05 of 0.006 and 0.040 which are statistically significant. The a p-value of 0.000 being less than al- pha 0.05 shows that the model is a good fit for the data indicating a statistical significance between predictor variables and the size of IWD’s. Given an F-value of 15.305 and a significance at 0.000, it can be concluded that the predictor variables deployed in the study can reliably predict the response of Y1. Conclusion: The novelty of the study is in developing an alternative explanation for the apparent contradiction between low income dis- tricts and high volumes of waste dumping. Implications of the finds are discussed with reference to urban planning in Sub-Sahara Africa

Kabale University