Green Cleaning for the Sri Lankan Healthcare Sector: Critical Support Factors and Barriers

The extensive use of cleaning chemicals and disinfectants in the healthcare industry in recent years has raised concerns over the effectiveness of conventional cleaning in creating safe and healthy environments. Green cleaning was introduced in the 1980s as a substitute for conventional cleaning. Green cleaning denotes methods and products of cleaning, which incorporate environmentally friendly ingredients that preserve human health and environmental quality. Even though there is a rapid adoption of green cleaning in many countries, Sri Lanka seems to fall behind in shifting to green cleaning. This research focuses on investigating the factors that either support or obstruct green cleaning in Sri Lanka. A qualitative research involving interviews of experts were conducted among cleaning related managerial personals and the data was analyzed through content analysis. The paper concludes that the most notable support factors were proper awareness, training and education, top management commitment and availability of green cleaning legislation and guidelines. The barriers were lack of awareness of the stakeholders, lack of top management commitment, lack of technical advancement in the country and lack of government support.