Household plastic waste collection in Swedish municipalities : a spatial-econometric approach

• This paper investigates the main determinants of collection rates of household plastic packaging waste in Swedish municipalities. This is done by the use of spatial econometric methods based on cross-sectional data for 282 Swedish municipalities in 2005. The empirical results suggest that the collection of plastic packaging is positively related to collection in neighboring municipalities. The analysis also shows that municipalities that employ weight-based waste management fees generally experience higher collection rates than those municipalities in which volume-based fees are used. The presence of curbside recycling and a high intensity of recycling drop-off stations, both measures that facilitate recycling efforts by creating the infrastructural and logistic mechanisms that enable people to translate their motivation into recycling action, provide important explanations for why some municipalities perform better than others. Overall the impacts on collection outcomes of a number of important regional cost variables, such as distance to recycling industry, urbanization rate and population density, turn out, though, both statistically and economically insignificant. An important explanation for this is that the (fixed) monetary compensations from the material companies to the collection entrepreneurs in Sweden vary depending on region and is typically higher in high-cost regions. This implies that the plastic packaging collection in Sweden may be performed in a cost ineffective manner.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Ekonomi och näringsliv -- Nationalekonomi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Economics and Business -- Economics (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Economics

Nationalekonomi

Publikations- och innehållstyp

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