Residents’ Household Solid Waste (HSW) Source Separation Activity: A Case Study of Suzhou, China

Hua Zhang and Zong-Guo Wen
Additional contact information
Hua Zhang: School of Humanities and Economic Management, China University of Geosciences, Beijing 100083, China
Zong-Guo Wen: State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (SKLESPC), School of Environment, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

Sustainability, 2014, vol. 6, issue 9, 1-21

Abstract: Though the Suzhou government has provided household solid waste (HSW) source separation since 2000, the program remains largely ineffective. Between January and March 2014, the authors conducted an intercept survey in five different community groups in Suzhou, and 505 valid surveys were completed. Based on the survey, the authors used an ordered probit regression to study residents’ HSW source separation activities for both Suzhou and for the five community groups. Results showed that 43% of the respondents in Suzhou thought they knew how to source separate HSW, and 29% of them have source separated HSW accurately. The results also found that the current HSW source separation pilot program in Suzhou is valid, as HSW source separation facilities and residents’ separation behavior both became better and better along with the program implementation. The main determinants of residents’ HSW source separation behavior are residents’ age, HSW source separation facilities and government preferential policies. The accessibility to waste management service is particularly important. Attitudes and willingness do not have significant impacts on residents’ HSW source separation behavior.

Keywords: household solid waste (HSW); source separation; residents’ behavior; community types; age groups (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (17)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/6/9/6446/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/6/9/6446/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:6:y:2014:i:9:p:6446-6466:d:40605

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().