ARE DEVELOPING COUNTRIES READY FOR FIRST WORLD WASTE POLICY INSTRUMENTS?

The findings of on-going research conducted within South Africa on waste policy
instruments shows that while typical command-and-control instruments lack effective
monitoring and enforcement, alternative policy instruments such as economic or information
based strategies, are either slow to find favour or fail soon after implementation. Developing
countries, such as South Africa, face a number of challenges to the successful implementation of
alternative, first world, waste policy instruments including institutional challenges (financial and
human resources); insufficient political support; an unsupportive legal environment; lack of
clarity regarding the role of government and the intention of policy, leading to a lack of
ownership and to ineffective policy; and a lack of supporting data. However, these challenges
do not imply that there is no place for such instruments in developing countries. Instead, what is
needed in the implementation of waste policy instruments in developing countries is a stagebased,
tailored approach, which takes cognisance of identified challenges in their design and
implementation, thereby recognising the realities of developing country circumstances.