Publications

‘Operator Models: Respecting Diversity’

This study on operator models for integrated sustainable waste management (ISWM) aims to understand and classify the diversity of ways in which waste management services are organized across the world. The study has involved in-depth case studies in 5 cities in different parts of the world, and research into 23 other secondary cases.

The Source Book looks at the range of ways ISWM is organized at a local level and understanding the conditions and capacities that influence decision-making on different model-types implemented. It illustrates the importance of understanding and integrating local objectives when implementing projects under development cooperation programmes.

The Guidance Paper provides a methodology for identifying and selecting the integrated sustainable waste management (ISWM) operator models most suited to your local situation. 

The aim is to provide a methodology that can assist you make an informed decision about which operator models to try out, and to provide you a menu of options to chose from. The Guide provides a series of checklists to help you:

  • Identify problems and framework conditions;
  • Formulate and prioritize objectives;
  • Assess conditions and capacities; and
  • Select an appropriate model or combination of models.

In an Annex to the Guidance Paper, we summarise the common operator models (coms) in use within ISWM systems worldwide, describe their advantages and drawbacks, and provide a handy tool for designing your ISWM system. 

Source Book
Guidance Paper

 

The 9DBs is a new conceptual framework and global theory of waste and development. It builds on the Integrated Sustainable Waste Management (ISWM) analytical framework to help characterise Waste and Resources Management (WaRM) systems in cities and countries. 
The early DBs reflect stepwise improvement towards the new baseline of meeting the SDG 11.6.1 indicators of universal collection and management in controlled facilities (DB5); while later DBs represent two prevailing routes to move towards environmentally sound management and the 3Rs (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle). An aspirational DB Zero sits above all 9 DBs, accessible via multiple pathways, posing an ultimate challenge for development practice. 
The 9DBs contextualise the challenge of meeting the waste-related SDGs, in particular for developing countries striving towards SDG 11.6.1 but also for all countries aspiring to a circular economy. 
Whether you are a practitioner, decision-maker, service provider, or sector activist, the 9DBs will help you to identify the key pressure points for catalysing change, and focus your time and resources on achieving maximum impact.

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In 2014, Zero Waste SA engaged a team of international and Australian waste management experts to provide an independent review of South Australia’s Waste Strategy 2011–2015. The objectives of the review were to:

  • understand and analyse South Australia’s waste strategy and programs
  • review international best practice in waste management
  • identify critical needs for the next strategy period
  • assess institutional delivery options to best meet these needs.
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This paper argues that integrated solid waste management (SWM) interventions are often ill-designed in the Global South because they rely on the waste hierarchy created for the Global North. Poorly designed and planned interventions have led global development agencies, practitioners, national/local authorities, and the civil society (amongst others) to spend resources on activities which yield minimum impact and do not improve neither public health nor environmental protection. A reframed hierarchy, or an investment/intervention hierarchy rather than a policy guiding hierarchy, is needed for integrated SWM interventions to be impactful and resilient in developing contexts.

This opinion paper proposes to rethink the waste hierarchy for SWM interventions in the Global South, to achieve three objectives:

  1. Tackle greenwashing
  2. Address the practical challenges of local authorities in the Global South
  3. Create a donor focus on operational support and strengthening, rather than on investment
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