Understanding the role of informal sector for sustainable development of municipal solid waste management system: A case study in Vietnam

Highlights

• Informal sector is an integral part of waste collection and recycling system.

• The informal sector should be integrated into formal waste management system.

• Causal loop diagrams are developed for waste collection and recycling system.

• It can be used to decide leverage points for policy implementation.

• Promoting informal sector is reasonable to diversify income sources of poor people.

Abstract

Although the informal sector of waste collection has an important role in income diversification for the poor and contribution to waste recycling, this sector is still not recognised in any government official policies and is usually underestimated in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam. This paper employs a systems thinking approach to analyse the crucial roles of the informal sector in solid waste management (SWM) system in Vietnam. From a circular economy viewpoint, the flow diagram was built for the first time, which could integrate the actors and activities of the informal sector into a wider SWM system in Vietnam. The map focuses on analysing the contributions and activities of the informal sector, focusing on its roles and impacts on the recycling system. This paper then employed the systems thinking approach to further analyse the systematic problem of the informal sector. The analysis builds on the field survey including elements and key driving forces of the systems with 36 scrap dealers, 127 scrap buyers, and 760 households and in-depth interviews with experts in the Mekong Delta region, Vietnam. Based on the practices and experience in waste-related activities of informal sector, this sector should be integrated into the general waste management process. With the relevance of informal systems, the authorities could establish an effective waste recycling system, and improve the livelihoods and working conditions of those involved, especially the poor.

Introduction

In addition to efforts to mitigate the impact of climate change, governments around the world are struggling to cope with an internal problem - waste management and disposal. Driven by rapid urbanisation and population growth, the economies exist in a linear form and generate an enormous amount of waste from the sphere of production and consumption. According to the report of the World Bank, if urgent action is not taken immediately, global waste is expected to lift by 70% at current levels by 2050 (Kaza et al., 2018).

On that account, many economies have begun to move towards more sustainable development by shifting to the model of a circular economy. In other words, the economy will efficiently operate and grow while minimising environmental impacts and externalities. Circular economy is defined as “an economy constructed from societal production-consumption systems that maximizes the service produced from the linear nature-society-nature material and energy throughput flow. This is done by using cyclical materials flows, renewable energy sources and cascading-type energy flows” (Korhonen et al., 2018, p. 39). Several countries have developed specific strategies, such as European countries with policies of turn-waste-into-resources through the 4Rs model – remanufacturing, refurbishing, repair, and direct reuse (European Union, 2017); Japan with the concept of Sound-Material-Cycle-Society (Moriguchi, 2007, Namiki, 2008); or the US with the Sustainable Materials Management initiative for which regulatory agencies have developed strategic plans (Anshassi et al., 2019). This transformation, in which materials are used more effectively and waste is no longer created, requires a systematic consolidation of the hierarchical waste system in national economies. To achieve that goal, the development of an optimal waste management and treatment system should be a top priority. Even so, the management and treatment of waste have invariably been one of the biggest challenges faced by the major conurbations, particularly in the developing world, such as Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries (Grau et al., 2015, Hettiarachchi et al., 2018) or developing Asian countries (Paul et al., 2012). Digging deeper, in many developing countries, the informal waste sectors took over the waste collection and recovery activities with a large extent. It appeared that the integration of the informal sector into municipal solid waste management is needed and feasible. Yet, it requires significant investments and efforts from stakeholders and authorities (Paul et al., 2012).

Being in a similar situation to other developing countries, Vietnam is a fast urbanising country with the intensive growth of the urban population. Accordingly, Vietnam targets to strengthen integrated solid waste management capacity to 2025 with a vision to 2050 as reflected in Decision No.491/QĐ-TTg. The Decision focused on four solutions, which are (1) promote solid waste storage, collection, transportation, reuse, recycling, and treatment; (2) expand solid waste collection network; (3) promote classification of solid waste at the source with prevention and minimisation of solid waste generation in daily life, production, business, and services; (4) promote socialisation and attract investment from the private and foreign sectors in domestic solid waste management. However, Vietnam still faces difficulties in finding suitable and proper municipal SWM systems at a rapid pace of urbanisation and improper planning. Debates on the overload situation of waste-related problems in Vietnam as well as other developing countries could be attributed to two main reasons. The first is budget shortages, thereby the investment on waste management system is still at a low level and lack of synchronous, especially in disposal technology and recycling activity (Lohri et al., 2014, Yukalang et al., 2017). The second is the ever-growing amount of waste. The generation of waste is increasingly diverse in terms of number, types, and difficult-to-handle nature, whereas the capability of the SWM system still has weaknesses and inadequacy especially in the collection – transportation – treatment process (Huynh et al., 2017, Yu et al., 2010). The total volume of generated household solid waste in Vietnam is estimated at 25.5 million tonnes in 2018, in which urban household waste is about 38,000 tonnes/day and rural household waste is 32,000 tonnes/day (Nguyen et al., 2019). Also, it is projected that the volume of waste increases by 10–16% per year (Vietnam Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, 2011). Debate on the issues around the current situation of the formal SWM systems and disposal capacity, Le et al. (2018) showed that the total amount of general solid waste collected in Vietnam was more than 33,100 tonnes/day in 2016, of which the proportion of treated waste under Vietnam’s technical regulations and standards was at about 81%. The amount of urban solid waste collected and treated in the Mekong Delta accounts for about 80% of the total generated SW and is lower than the national average rate of 87.98% (Vietnam Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, 2020). It should be noticed that treatment in Vietnam is limited in burning and burying only and it has no available data about the total volume of uncollected waste (Nguyen and Matsui, 2011, Truong and Vu, 2019).

Noticeably, the current formal waste management and disposal systems of Vietnam are lacking an effective method of treating waste towards the circular economy. Instead of recovering secondary materials from the collection process, post-consumer waste is directly sent to landfills or incinerators as the only two methods in this disposal scheme. To put it another way, it is due to the absence of a material recycling step in the official treatment scheme, recycling objective mostly relies on private and informal sectors before rubbish is treated by the formal programme. Therefore, recycling activity was only being carried out by the informal sector. As observed in our survey, local craft villages and recycling facilities are run by private-owned businesses. However, local governments and policy-makers ignored their contribution and participation. For example, local reports only mention that the recycling activities are limited in selling recyclable materials and with no further details (Ben Tre People’s Committee, 2019, Can Tho People’s Committee, 2018, Soc Trang People’s Committee, 2019). At the national level, this was shown in relevant government reports with very superficial attention and no further available data on it, such as Vietnam Environment Report on Solid Waste Management (Vietnam Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, 2011), Vietnam Solid and Industrial Hazardous Waste Management Assessment (van den Berg and Duong, 2018).

Our analysis of literature and reported involved SWM system in Vietnam showed that scholar studies on waste management in Vietnam are limited to waste component analysis, and general assessment on the role of formal activities (Kawai and Osako, 2013, Lockrey et al., 2016, Nguyen et al., 2009, Schneider et al., 2017a, Schneider et al., 2017b). There is very little research focusing on evaluating roles and the ability to modernise informal sector (Kawai et al., 2012, Mitchell, 2009, Mitchell, 2008). The role of informal workers was first accentuated and studied in Vietnam in the 1990s and early 2000s (Digregorio, 1994, Ngo, 2001). Until 2012, Kawai et al. (2012) researched scrap buyers’ contribution to the recycling of household waste in Hanoi, Vietnam by using physical composition analysis. Nevertheless, it is limited to describing the status quo of the informal sector and failed to address the barriers of development or innovation under a systematic perspective. Meanwhile, there are more detailed studies conducted in developing countries (Agamuthu, 2010, Omotoso, 2017, Paul et al., 2012, Scheinberg et al., 2010). For the case of Vietnam, they have highlighted that informal recycling activities not only have positive effects on the environment by reducing 15–20% of the waste amount sent to landfills (Nguyen, 2014) and reduce the costs of SWM systems but also provide income opportunities for the poor communities who lack sources to make a living (Baud et al., 2001).

This research is centralised on understanding the nature of formal and informal waste management operations. By applying the systems thinking approach, this study was expected to contribute an adequate and insightful analysis of all actors in the waste management systems of Vietnam, especially accentuate the role of the informal sector in material recovery activities. In doing so, this paper, therefore, supports waste management and development stakeholders, policy-makers in making good decisions about how to handle and work with the informal solid waste sector, and improve the SWM system as a whole towards sustainable dimension. Moreover, studies looking at this topic in MRD as mentioned are rare. Therefore, this paper contributes to significant gaps in the literature by describing the current situation and proposing management policies. The paper is prearranged as follows. We first describe research materials and the method employed to assess and understand the SWM system. We then turn to a demonstration of the current situation of the SWM system. Next, we develop the causal loop diagrams (CLDs) to understand the mechanism and operation of SWM activities. Finally, further discussion and policy implementation are presented.