1. Introduction

Waste management remains a major challenge to management governments in Africa. In Ghana, the increasing rate at which waste is generated in the cities is alarming; yet government has not been able to respond in an equal measure. The proportion of populations living in urban areas in Africa is expected to increase from 40% in 2010 to about 57% in 2050 [1]. This incomparable rise in the level of urbanization in the first half of the twenty-first century Africa has goaded a variety of questions, apprehension, and agitation about the possible connotations of this

development on the quality of life of Africa's rising population, and for environmental health in general [2]. This phenomenon has unquestionably buoyed a proclivity to consider the twenty-first century as marshaling in a period of predominantly urban civilization in Africa where urbanism is rapidly dominating ruralism [3]. Yet, the challenge of considerable transformation in the manner and pattern of urban functionality becomes ever more complex in the midst of unsustainable waste management problems [4].

The last three decades have seen a tremendous shift in government policies toward decentralization in the developing world. These policies are typically a component of comprehensive process of political, economic, social and technical reforms [5]. This has been inspired by new efforts of democratization and process of 'modernization' of the state. It can be argued that these initiatives combined to foster accountability, cost consciousness and competition in the public sector as well as develop a new role for the state in enabling and regulating rather than taking the place of the private sector. On the flipside, solid waste management (SWM) has become an important part of the urban environment as well as the planning of the urban infrastructure to safeguard a safe and healthy human environment. Continuous urbanization of developing countries at a very high rate has created serious problems of waste disposal as a result of uncontrolled and unmonitored urbanization [6]. Waste is a continually growing problem at the global, regional and local levels. The World Bank [7, 8], reported that there will be 70% increase in urban solid waste globally with a projected rise in the amount of waste, from 1.3 to 2.2 billion tonnes per year from 2012 to 2025, which will lead to a rise in the annual global costs of global waste from \$205 billion to \$375 billion. Within the same 13 years span, developing countries are facing the greatest challenges in the waste management sector.

In Africa, the poor state of solid waste management in urban areas is not only an environmental problem but also a major social handicap. In Kenya, it is expected that the amount of solid waste generated will increase from 2000 to 10,171 tonnes per day by 2025 [9]. The problem is further aggravated by the lack of financial as well as technical expertise in SWM technology and management especially in the sphere of collection, transportation, processing and final disposal. Whereas aspects like recycle, reuse and recovery of the solid waste is disorganized in most cases. In this context, the responsible persons or agencies concerned with public health and environment protection face the crisis of ineffective SWM. In the Ghanaian context, the situation is not different. Due to rapid urbanization, Ghana's major agglomerations have been growing quickly but have lacked a concurrent expansion in SWM. Addaney and Oppong [4] observe that Ghana like other developing countries has over the years had difficulties in municipal solid waste management with regards to infrastructural and technical inefficiencies. In view of this, the government has attempted to decentralize the SWM service delivery. These efforts have often become embroiled in politics, with less emphasis on efficient SWM delivery. In isolated cases where services have been decentralized, there have been inadequate policy direction and limited resource transfers to the lower levels of governance. Consequently, effective decentralized solid waste management has not been forthcoming.

The solid waste management subsector has been bedeviled with ineffectiveness despite the adoption of a number of policies and reform programs. Principally, decentralization has been designed to ensure efficiency and better service delivery at the local level. Despite this, there still exist challenges such as asymmetrical waste collection, waste overflow from bins, inadequate storage containers, and disposal of waste in unauthorized space in most municipalities in Ghana [4]. These challenges lead to public health hazards, esthetic nuisance, and environmental pollution. The

Decentralization and Solid Waste Management in Urbanizing Ghana… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.81894

public health implications have been fazing, accounting for about 5% of the GDP [10]. Data from the Ghana Health Service indicate that six (6) out of the top ten (10) diseases in Ghana are linked to poor environmental sanitation, with malaria, diarrhea and typhoid fever jointly constituting 70–85% of out-patient cases at health facilities [10]. The Berekum and Dormaa Municipalities are no exception to these undesirable environmental problems.

Therefore, this study attempts to unpack the difficulties face by the municipal authorities in keeping pace with solid waste facilities development and management. It is driven by the question of how decentralized SWM has evolved to ensure quality and sustainable service delivery in the medium-size towns of Berekum and Dormaa in the Brong Ahafo Region of Ghana. It analyzed the evolving practices of decentralized solid waste collection for sustainable service delivery, the service quality of decentralized urban SWM institutions; and the factors which explain the differences in service quality of the decentralized SWM of the two municipalities. It adopts the assertion that the inability of municipal authorities to effectively manage their solid waste usually leads to inefficient use of time and resources, and which eventually leads low productivity and poor service quality [4, 11].

## 2. Municipal solid waste management: theories and normative practices

Generating solid waste (SW) is inevitable. Cities in developing countries have frequently been unable to keep up with the provision of basic services [12]. About 40% of the solid waste generated in developing countries is uncollected, piles up on streets and in drains, contributing to flooding and the spread of disease. In addition, domestic and industrial effluents are often released into waterways with little or no treatment [12]. Solid waste has been a major challenge for municipal authorities for about 6000 years now [13]. The concept of waste is relative in two main respects. Firstly, something becomes waste when it loses its primary function for the user. Hence, one person's waste output is often someone else's raw material input. Secondly, the notion of waste is also relative to the technological state of the art and to the location of its generation ([14], p. 70). Waste is therefore a very dynamic concept and must be looked at within these two contexts. Many transnational organizations including the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) have their own definitions to the notion of waste. The UNEP [15] defined waste as any substances or objects which are disposed of or are intended to be disposed of or are required to be disposed of by national law.

Wastes that are solid are termed to as "refuse" or solid waste [16]. Waste has been defined differently by many Authors with different meaning. One definition is that waste is 'unwanted' by the first user. It is therefore anything that is no longer 'unwanted' dependent on the time and the prevailing circumstances. Solid waste today is increasingly defined as "natural resources out of place" or as "new materials for technologies not yet found" [17]. Many governments now regard waste as a useful source of income and as such policies have been geared toward this potential by both the government and the public sector to harnessing this potential. The recycling subsector for example, is an essential industry generating revenues and jobs for a larger number of people in the world today. Waste Watchers [18] defined solid waste management as everything that must be done to handle all the solid waste produced in a community, including collecting, transporting, processing and disposal of waste. Similar to this is the one put forward by Tchobanoglous et al. [19] that SWM involves the collection, treatment and disposal of non-hazardous waste.

Waste generation is the most important aspect to look at in order to have effective SWM system. The generation of waste varies considerably between countries based on the culture, public awareness and management [20, 21]. Waste generation comprise those activities in which materials are identified as no longer of any value by the owners/users and either thrown away or gathered for disposal [22]. Generally, developed countries generate more waste than developing countries [23]. Countries in Asian and African region produce waste in the range of 0.21–0.37 tonnes/capita/year, while European countries generate higher amount of waste with 0.38–0.64 tonnes/capita/year [24]. The waste generated by a population is a function of consumption patterns and thus of socioeconomic characteristics and the interest in and willingness to pay for collection services ([25], p. 35).

Disposal is broadly defined to include the collection, storage, treatment or processing, utilization, or final disposal of waste. It involves the process of getting rid of the waste materials that people generate [26]. Information on waste generation is important to determine the most suitable waste disposal options. The main purpose in implementing best practice for solid waste management is to prevent pollution. Pollution is a threat to human and other living organism and it may also damage the ecosystem and disrupt the natural cycle and climate on earth [27]. There are many disposal options available to suit the nature of waste and a country's preference and interest. Economics and environmental aspects of waste disposal option are always the main issue in choosing the right technology [28]. Most developed countries, are on their way to eliminate land filling while some other countries still have problems with open dumping [29, 30].

Despite the development of many waste disposal option, landfills remain the most prominent system applied worldwide [30, 31]. Although a lot of improvement had been possible in the land filling system and the regulation on the type of waste that can be treated at landfill is stringent, most of landfills operated remain primitive [31]. Ayomoh et al. [32] had listed few problems related to improper landfill operation including, health deterioration, accidents, flood occurrences, pollution of surface and underground waters, unpleasant odor, pest infestation and gas explosion. Although the impacts from landfills are known, impacts from other alternative remain unanswered thus subject to critics [31]. Incineration has been the choice for developed countries as they have sufficient financial input and are looking into energy recovery from waste [33, 34]. Small countries such as Singapore adopt incineration as their waste disposal option due to scarcity of land [35]. Even that, incineration is also associated with some other risks. This includes the generation of carcinogenic and toxic compound.

Some scholars have observed that the impacts from incineration are overemphasized and the advancing technology had highly reduced the environmental impacts [31]. However, many of the countries prefer waste minimization compared to waste treatment such as landfill or incineration [35, 36]. Technology is advancing every day and chemical recycling of plastic wastes has also been made possible in these developed countries [37]. Regardless of the technology chosen, each has its advantages and disadvantages. The information on each disposal option needs to be clarified to determine the suitable option for each particular country. Few tools had been used in the environmental evaluation including in determining best waste disposal option. For example, life cycle assessment determined that the most economically feasible option for traditional market waste management in Indonesia is composting at a centralized plant, while biogas production option has the lowest environmental impact [28]. SW Plan software particularly to calculate capital and management cost is also available to determine the best integrated technology in waste management [38].
