Home Composting and Factors for Potential Adoption: Knowledge and Persuasion

Abstract

The increase in municipal solid waste has been considered a worldwide issue and the organic fraction represents the largest share of total solid waste. Home composting is an efficient way to convert organic waste into fertilizer, but so far this technique has not been widely adopted by society. Therefore, this paper aims to identify the factors of knowledge and persuasion that boost the adoption of home composting through Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations Theory. A survey was conducted with respondents from the city of La Paz B.C.S. Frequency analysis, crosstabulations, and ordinal logistic regression was performed for data analysis. Most of the respondents were found to have awareness and knowledge of composting. Among the factors promoting adoption were gender, garden space, time investment, willingness to teach others, and perception as a simple activity.

Keywords

• sustainability; Diffusion of Innovations; management; organic waste; perception; recycling, society; behavior, survey