Solid Waste Management and Recycling

TRADE AND RECYCLING OF URBAN INORGANIC SOLID WASTE IN NAIROBI 165

The social and operational relationships that exist in the chain of recovery, reuse and
recycling processes find expression in the way prices are fixed, the exchange of vital
information regarding sales and material preferences, as well as the arrangements
made to transport waste. Forms of social security include advancing interest free loans
and sometimes non-material support in times of adversity between traders and pickers
Assistance is also provided through the supply of waste material on credit. These rela-
tionships are fundamental in analysing the effects of these activities on sustainable
development as they enable actors to survive. Relationships are found:

• Amongst the waste pickers (intra-group)


• Between waste pickers and buyers


• Between itinerant byers and dealers


• Between dealers and wholesalers,


• Between wholesalers and recycling factories


• Between dealers and small and large-scale recycling units


• Between these categories and the producers of solid waste

The lower-income actors have a livelihood approach (see Figure 8.1). Waste picking
is a survival strategy for the poor and unemployed of the city. People engaged in it
generally lack access to basic necessities of life. Their lives are also characterised by
insecurity and vulnerability. Waste picking is in their view the only legitimate means
of eking out a living, through actual generation of income as well as access to non-cash
benefits. For the larger more formal actors, it is an investment from which they
endeavour to generate returns. The two are however intricately intertwined with larger
scale, more formal production enterprises providing the impetus for the activities at
lower income levels.

Figure 8.1.The recycling chain for inorganic waste materials in Nairobi

SOURCE

Public dustbins

Informal garbage dumps

Street waste

Itinerant buyers Waste pickers Waste dealer

Small scale

recycling

enterprises

Wholesaler

(Paper)

Formal

dump

Large recycling

enterprises

Livelihood level

Enterprise/employment level