University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU) - Research portal

Navigation/Search

• Researchers.
• Institutes.
• Projects.
• Publications.
• Partners.
• Sponsors.

Gewählte Doctoral Thesis:

Sandra Roxana Aparcana Robles (2013): DEVELOPMENT OF A SOCIAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT METHODOLOGY FOR RECYCLING SYSTEMS IN LOW INCOME COUNTRIES.
Doctoral Thesis - Institut für Abfallwirtschaft (ABF-BOKU), BOKU-Universität für Bodenkultur, pp S. 43 und Anhänge. UB BOKU obvsg FullText

Abstract:

Informal recycling is one of the most significant activities within waste management systems in low income countries. The main aspect of a number of recently implemented waste management systems has been to organise the informal recycling sector and to integrate it as a formal stakeholder. These formalisation approaches are expected to eliminate not only the poor economic situation of informal recyclers but also their common social problems e.g. social rejection, lack of education and inappropriate health and working conditions. However the effectively elimination of social problems related to the informal sector has not been precisely measured and evaluated. A lack of methodology to assess social impacts persists, as does the comparison of different formalisation approaches. This work aims to develop a methodology for assessing the contribution of formalisation approaches in terms of social impacts. A further goal is to determine the feasibility of applying this methodology by identifying and measuring the social impacts of three case studies in Peru. For the social impact assessment this study proposes an approach based oriented towards the Social Life Cycle Assessment methodology (sLCA) considering 3 social impact categories, 9 social subcategories and 26 semi-quantitative indicators for the social. The methodology was tested on three Peruvian case studies with two different formalisation approaches thereby confirming or rebutting the expectations and forecasts of organisations (NGOs, Local Authorities, Ministries & Business) involved in the implementation. It can be concluded that although sLCA was originally used to analyse the environmental impacts of products, it is feasible to adapt it for the social assessment of recycling systems based on formalisation of the informal sector in low income countries. The impact categories and subcategories identified represent the social problems of informal recyclers. The comparison of current social impacts between different formalisation approaches using this methodology is also viable. A further conclusion is that it is feasible to measure the social impacts of formalisation approaches using the selected indicators and characterisation procedure

Betreuer: Salhofer Stefan Petrus

2. Berater:

3. Berater: Ramusch Roland