ORIGINAL ARTICLE Adoption of post-disaster waste management plan into disaster management guidelines for Malaysia E. M. A. Zawawi 1 • Nor Syazwani Yusof 1 • Zulhabri Ismail 1 Received: 29 June 2016 / Accepted: 23 November 2016 Ó Springer Japan 2016 Abstract Malaysia is one of the Asian countries which are prone to disaster: flooding is one of the natural disasters that are becoming more common in Malaysia every year, threatening life. Disaster waste management is, therefore, one of the most important issues to address. Furthermore, as urbanization, population growth, and economic devel- opment increase, this leads to larger quantities of disaster waste requiring more systematic management, and this is becoming one of the most critical environmental issues to be tackled. This research aims to highlight possible entry points for waste management adoption into disaster man- agement guidelines for Malaysia. Furthermore, the extent of disaster waste affecting the environment will be inves- tigated, to identify the needs of waste management to be adopted as disaster management guidelines. Ultimately, the research intends to propose the adoption of a post-disaster waste management plan into the existing disaster man- agement guidelines in Malaysia. In fact, an act and policies with regard to waste management have already been enacted and developed, but none of them focuses on dis- aster waste. Comparative studies will be conducted to benchmark waste management practices in other countries, to produce a systematic plan for post-disaster waste man- agement in Malaysia. Qualitative research design methods will be rigorously applied by reviewing existing studies and carrying out semi-structured interviews. This paper presents an overview of disaster waste management, out- lining the issues and challenges encountered during managing disaster waste, exploring existing guidelines on waste management, and discovering ways to improve the current situation by comparing it with the disaster waste management planning of more experienced countries, such as Japan, the USA (North Carolina), and Indonesia. Keywords Disaster waste management Á Guidelines Á Waste management plan Introduction Malaysia is considered a middle-income country and has emerged as a multi-sector economy. In the past, Malaysia has faced a variety of disasters of various magnitudes, including structural collapse, earthquakes, biological haz- ards, landslides, and meteorological incidents [25]. In addition, the effects of climate change have resulted in an increasing amount of climate-related disasters, resulting in a newfound threat to Malaysia’s health and development [29]. Disasters, whether natural or manmade, are becoming increasingly common. The recent history of Malaysia’s notable disasters from 1991 to 2015, with the type of waste generated, is shown in Table 1,[2] and [25]. Every single day, we produced a lot of waste, a common phenomenon in Malaysia. In addition, Malaysia suffers from natural dis- asters, such as flooding and landslides caused by torrential rain, particularly severe at the end of 2014. Such disasters often create large volumes of debris and waste which exceed the existing capacity of solid waste management. A waste management plan related to the current planning for post-disaster waste management has been conducted by several agencies and relevant stakeholders who are involved directly or indirectly. Poor management of a clean-up effort can exacerbate the problems, and can result & E. M. A. Zawawi emmamarinie@salam.uitm.edu.my 1 Centre of Studies for Construction, Faculty of Architecture, Planning and Surveying, UiTM Shah Alam, 40450 Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia 123 J Mater Cycles Waste Manag DOI 10.1007/s10163-016-0569-x