Espacio y Desarrollo (Nov 2011)
La gestión de los residuos sólidos en los países en desarrollo: ¿cómo obtener beneficios de las dificultades actuales?
Abstract
Solid waste management in the less developed countries: how to overcome present difficulties and to obtain benefits? The study of urban waste management in less developed countries permits us to put into evidence different systems. Each of these has its own logic, but they are strongly inter weaved. Their «modelization» (that is, their simplification), which we propose to do in this paper, looks to illuminate the principal characteristics of a very complex reality. We propose to observe three systems that respond to both geographic and historic logics. They refer to «self management» of the «public management» and of the «shared management». These three systems are imbricated to allow the management of waste in a city such as Lima (Perú), finally building a «compound system». Following the example of the management of solid waste in the Northern countries, most part of the public policies of the South cities look for technically modernize the management of their waste. The hypothesis of this text is that this strategy builds strong inequalities in such cities, related to the quality of service, because they do not have the resources to put them into functioning in all their territories. On the contrary, some experiences, even minor, look for taking advantage of the present condition, taking in account the best way of the different dimensions of sustainable development, by using the strong practice points of certain populations, such as the recyclers. This voluntarist adaptation should, however, make malabar with the different population vulnerabilities, designed to a progressive attenuation.
