Measuring waste generation in third world cities: A case study of Ilorin, Nigeria

Problems associated with urban wastes are now at crisis stage in Nigeria. All efforts made to solve the problems have failed, as the efforts were directed towards instant cleaning rather than long lasting programs to cope with problems associated with environmental sanitation. Measurements were taken of the domestic waste generated by randomly selected households in Ilorin, to predict the generation rate for the city. The data was subjected to various analyses. The models used in developed nations were found inappropriate to predict the waste generation rate of the people at Ilorin because of cultural factors. Various methods to cope with the environmental sanitation problems of cities of developing areas were then suggested.