Local Market Institutions and Solid Waste Management in Accra’s Open-Air Markets

Abstract

Solid waste management is a global concern that has been handled in several ways in different parts of the world. In cities of the Global North, measures meant to prevent or minimise solid waste generation and its associated challenges are based on the waste management hierarchy, whereas in cities in the Global South, the active involvement of the public and private sectors is well documented. Existing studies cover practices of solid waste collection, reuse, recycling and landfilling by private formal and private informal actors. The term informal actors has often been used to refer to itinerant waste buyers, waste pickers and recyclers. Local African institutions existing in marketplaces – such as women known as ‘market queens’ or ‘commodity queens’ and market chairmen, whose management roles are not necessarily geared towards livelihood creation – have, however, been neglected. This lack of attention to the roles of local institutions in solid waste management potentially undermines efforts aimed at waste minimisation and the achievement of policy measures such as the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (Sustainable Development Goal 11) that seeks to make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. Hence, based on the cases of the Kaneshie, Kantamanto and Madina markets in Accra, empirical evidence of the role that local market institutions play in solid waste management is provided. Based on this, an argument is made for removing structural barriers impeding local market institutions’ participation in existing systems for managing urban market environments.