Assessment of community perception on waste management practice in Ilorin metropolis, Kwara State, Nigeria

Improper collection and disposal of municipal wastes has led to different levels of environmental challenges such as blockade of sewers, drain networks and the choking of water bodies. The study adopted descriptive survey research design. The population of the study comprised of 364,666. The researcher used simple random sampling random technique to select 200 respondents in the targeted communities. The questionnaire used to collect information from the respondents was tagged Community Perception on Waste Management Practice Instrument (CPWMPI). The instrument was validated by the experts in the Department of Adult and Primary Education, University of Ilorin to ensure face, content and construct validity. To ascertain the reliability of the instrument, the questionnaire was administered to fifty respondents twice. The data collected were analyzed with the Person Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) tool, a co-efficient value of 0.89 was obtained. Inferential statistics was used to analyzed the research question while the hypotheses were analyzed with t-test and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The result showed that there was a statistically significant difference in the perception of residents on waste management practices based on gender (t {198} = 2.643, p<0.05), there was no statistically significant difference in the perception of residents on waste management practices based on marital status (t{198} = 0.837, p>0.05), there was no significant difference in the perception of residents on waste management practices based on education (F {2, 197} = 1.592, p>0.05), there was no statistically significant difference in the perception of residents on waste management practices based on religions (t{198} = 1.427, p>0.05)It was recommended in the study that there should be public enlightenment among the residents and urban dwellers on proper solid waste practices, management and disposal.