Abstract
The increased production of household waste in most of the developing countries is a growing problem. Most of these countries have no treatment of the waste except disposing of it in a landfill. In order to improve the solid waste management of the city of Santiago de Cuba, an investigation of the households' waste production and treatment was conducted. In February of 2004, a survey of 1150 households was carried out with questions about the monthly consumed goods and their treatment. For the same households, a measurement of their produced waste was made by weighing the total amount and the components of the waste. In the paper, the distribution of the produced waste across the households and its composition will be presented. Also, the distribution of the treatment strategies of the households for the different waste components will be depicted. With a statistical cluster analysis, several household types could be differentiated. These household types were characterised by their produced waste, their socio-economic status, and their waste treatment behaviour. With the help of these results, several waste management strategies concerning amount and types of waste and its distribution across the city can be derived and will serve to improve the waste situation.
Mosler, Hans-Joachim