Global NEST Journal, Vol 20, No 2, pp 316-323 Copyright© 2018 Global NEST Printed in Greece. All rights reserved Bashir M.J.K., Tao G.H., Abu Amr S.S. and Tan K.W. (2018), Public concerns and behaviors towards solid waste minimization using composting in Kampar district, Malaysia, Global NEST Journal, 20(2), 316-323. Public concerns and behaviors towards solid waste minimization using composting in Kampar district, Malaysia Bashir M.J.K. 1,* , Tao G.H. 1 , Abu Amr S.S. 2 and Tan K.W. 1 1 Facult of Engineering and Green Technology Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, 31900 Kampar Perak, MALAYSIA. 2 Malaysian Institute of Chemical & Bioengineering Technology, Universiti Kuala Lumpur, (UniKL, MICET), Melaka 78000, Malaysia Received: 18/01/2018, Accepted: 17/02/2018, Available online: 28/06/2018 * to whom all correspondence should be addressed: e-mail: jkbashir@utar.edu.my; modbashir@gmail.com Abstract Municipal solid waste generation in Malaysia has increase significantly. Organic materials continue to be the major portion of solid waste generated in Kampar, Malaysia. As a result of increasing rate of waste generation and population growth, land area will become more demanding causing the increment of the cost in solid waste management. As a result, solid waste management will become more expensive in the future. Waste separation and organic composting can provide good solution in reducing waste disposal. Nevertheless, public awareness is an important key to improve solid waste management issue. During this study, questionnaire was designed to test out public general knowledge regarding waste management, and their willingness to do composting. 270 questionnaires were distributed to the public. Data analysis of the questionnaire shows that only a few of the respondents (24 numbers) have good awareness. Likert scale was applied to prioritize the factors that discourage waste separation and organic composting practices in Kampar District. This paper concluded that public education and awareness toward solid waste minimization using composting is crucial. Keywords: MSW, Waste management, Public awareness, composting, SPSS 1. Introduction Malaysia is a tropical nation which consists of total landmass of 329,847 km 2 (Abd Manaf et al., 2009). According to Department of Statistics of Malaysia (DSM, 2010), population of Malaysia has been estimated to be around 28,334,000 in the year of 2012 and 80% of population are living in Peninsular Malaysia while 20% are living in East Malaysia. In year 2012, total daily municipal solid waste (MSW) generation of 33,000 tons was recorded which had exceeded the projected waste generation (The Malaysian Times, 2013). In view of that, Malaysia disposes of 28,500 tonnes /day of MSW directly into landfills (Agamuthu and Fauziah 2011). Consequently, the need for sustainable landfills is very vital to avoid unwanted impacts to human health and the environment. Regrettably, economic development, which has been given higher priority than the concept of sustainable waste management, has resulted in the environment being sacrificed for the sake of economic targets (Agamuthu and Fauziah, 2011). Ministry of Housing and Local Government (GHLG, 2012) indicated that total 290 landfill sites have been built by Malaysian Government. About 176 of them are in operation and 114 have closed due to insufficient capacity. Based on Abd Manaf et al., (2009), there are only 8 landfill sites have met the standard requirement. It means that the rest of the landfill sites are polluting the environment in varying degrees such as ground water pollution, air pollution, health and sanitary problem (Kalanatarifard and Go, 2012; Bashir et al., 2015; Aziz et al., 2015). In developing countries, organic waste usually contributes highest percentage to the total waste generation. According to MHLG (2012), 50% of total generated waste in Malaysia is organic waste. Organic waste disposal in a landfill may create anaerobic process to environment. Emission of methane gas would be occurred during the process of anaerobic digestion. According to Johari et al. (2012), total 310,220 tons of methane gas was generated from the landfill site in Peninsular Malaysia in year 2010. It was estimated that the figure would be increased until 350,000 tons in year 2015 and 37,000 tons in year 2020 (Johari et al., 2012). To overcome organic waste problem, composting as a simple and cost-effective alternative method of organic waste management can be employed. However, the main issue which is needed to be addressed is the awareness and attitude of the public. Shaping public awareness and attitude are often a hard task especially when they have to change their perspective to accept a new solid waste disposal method. In addition, time and financial aid are needed for setting up action plan and policies, giving talks to the public, conducting campaign and etc. In Malaysia, effort for promoting waste composting is not sufficient, while public always claims that they are not given an opportunity to take part in these activities. Indeed, most of the public in Malaysia are not doing waste separation while most of the waste segregation works are done by scavenger in landfill site (Tan et al., 2013). Local authorities claimed that the public within their administrative boundary would not give full cooperation regarding to their