Household Willingness to Pay for solid Waste Disposal Services in Urban Ghana: The Kumasi Metropolis Situation

Abstract

Solid waste management has become inevitable in the global developmental processes. Thus, the sustainability of funds to manage solid waste is paramount, and it is contingent on the willingness of people to pay for improved solid waste disposal services. The paper, therefore, examined the factors that influence the willingness to pay for solid waste disposal in the Kumasi Metropolis. A sample size of 394 households was chosen using a simple random sampling technique. Logit regression was used to estimate the impacts that respondents' perceptions of certain variables had on residents’ willingness to pay for waste disposal services. These variables were: the effectiveness of bye-laws, the quality of services, income, education, awareness of health hazards of indiscriminate waste disposal, areas of residence and some socio-demographic variables. The study revealed that payment for solid waste disposal was not uncommon in the study area. The study found that area of residence, effective bye-laws, level of education and income were statistically significant regarding willingness to pay for solid disposal services. However, household size and respondents' awareness of health hazards of indiscriminate waste disposal did not have any effect on respondents' willingness to pay for improved solid waste services. Following from these results it is recommended that local government authorities should effectively implement the sanitation bye-laws and re-institute the sanitation court to deal with cases of improper solid waste disposal.