Investigating people’s engagement in sustainable waste management behaviours in Yangon, Myanmar

The purpose of this study is to understand how people participate in sustainable waste management behaviours (SWMBs) through protection motivation theory (PMT). The solid waste in Yangon has increased from 0.395 kg in 2001 to 0.5 kg per capita per day in 2015, and the estimated waste generation amount for 2050 is 1.22 kg per capita per day. Several environmental problems caused by waste are mainly because of human actions; hence, public participation in SWMBs should be extensively promoted. The Yangon metropolitan area is selected as a case study because it has had severe waste management issues in the previous 10 years because of rising solid waste volumes. Based on PMT, perceived severity of consequences caused by waste related problems, perceived probability of receiving those impacts, self-efficacy (perceived adaptation capability) and response efficacy (perceived effectiveness of SWMBs) are investigated for their effect on people’s engagement in SWMBs—including waste reduction, reusing, recycling, disposal and green purchasing behaviours. The sociodemographic factors such as age, gender, education, occupation, income and housing types are also investigated to determine whether they can moderate the relationship between people’s perception on risks and uncertainties and their waste management behaviours. The 156 respondents complete the questionnaire surveys. Multiple linear regression analyses are applied to explain how people's SWMBs are influenced by their perceptions of environmental contamination from waste disposal and their perceived coping abilities. According to the findings, people’s perceived effectiveness of SWMBs is the highest among other PMT variables while they show higher participation in waste reusing behaviours than other SWMBs. Self-efficacy is the only one predictor for collective SWMBs. For each behaviour, people's perceptions of the severity of negative effects produced by pollutants could influence waste reduction and green purchasing behaviours while self-efficacy could influence waste reduction and reusing behaviours of the respondents. Response efficacy, on the other hand, is able to influence recycling, disposal and green purchasing behaviours. People perceptions of the likelihood of being affected by pollutants is also not a significant predictor of all actions. Any sociodemographic factors could not moderate the extents of their relationship. As a result, PMT might be a good fit for explaining the basic SWMBs that will take low cost and simple effort. People’s stronger perception on risks and uncertainties can strengthen their engagement in SWMBs in Yangon regardless of their sociodemographic characteristics.