HOUSEHOLD SOLID WASTE DISPOSAL BEHAVIOUR AND ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH RISK IN THE ABSENCE OF REGULAR MUNICIPAL COLLECTION: EVIDENCE FROM ZARIA WALLED CITY, KADUNA STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

Where regular municipal solid waste collection fails, households adopt disposal practices that carry direct environmental and public health consequences. This study examines household solid waste disposal behaviour in Zaria Walled City, Kaduna State, Nigeria, and evaluates it against the spatial distribution and adequacy of formal collection infrastructure. Using a household survey (n = 288) across four districts, complemented by an inventory of formal collection points and direct field observation, the study finds that open burning is the dominant disposal method, practised by 70 percent of households overall and ranging from 28 percent in Kwarbai A to 61 percent in Kaura; only 21 percent of households use the twenty-four officially designated communal depots, no new depot having been sited since 1991. This pattern persists despite the fact that formal or informal waste collection is affordable to most households, with 84 percent paying only ₦100-₦200 per month, indicating that the binding constraint on safe disposal is infrastructural access rather than cost. The study situates these findings within the environmental health literature on open burning emissions and drainage blockage, and argues that the observed disposal pattern exposes residents to avoidable air pollution, flood risk from blocked drains, and land degradation at unmanaged open dump sites. Geographic Information System-based siting of new collection points and a sanitary landfill, combined with targeted risk communication in the worst-served districts, is proposed as a more effective intervention than affordability-focused measures alone.