The objectives of economic development and poverty alleviation, as they exist today, seem to be conflicting with environmental considerations, resulting in the absence of effective environmental management in the cities. Cities are full of contradictions for human development, resulting in centres of "growth and wealth" on the one hand and "need and poverty" on the other.

Today’s cities are duel systems providing many spaces for self-management and planning on the one hand, and restraining popular initiatives on the other. In view of the inadequacies of bureaucratic planning and technocratic management models, the prospects of strengthening popular autonomy and self expression will have to be effectively re-enforced and integrated for economic independence and political democracy.

It is widely accepted that industrialised countries account for a disproportionately high share of the world’s waste relative to their share of the world’s population.

Today’s urban environment is characterised by the problems which have global characteristics on the one hand, and possibilities of local solutions on the other. The efficiency of these local solutions have been well established in the given context. However, the effectiveness of their global application or possibilities for scaling up of these applications, have yet to be established.

Although, one can list a number of environmental issues that need immediate attention, the concerns of Preceup, both in terms of research and action, highlight four major dimensions. These major dimensions of urban environment, that is, air, water, solid waste, and sanitation, which affect the lifestyle, are influenced directly by the manner in which these dimensions are managed.

For the purpose of analysis, these dimensions have been elaborated in terms of the source, the impacts, the management process, the technologies, and the actors involved highlighting certain common characteristics and distinctions.

Since solid waste management represents a more complex and comprehensive dimension, this document tries to explore further details with regard to the various stages in the solid waste management cycle.

Although there are community initiatives to separate and collect waste for sale and reuse, these activities are "informal" and usually not supported by the municipal authorities. The decision making process is slow and complicated, and this is a factor in illegal dumping of hazardous substances on lands and into the waterways.

Formal sector solid waste management in the Asian cities is poor, in many cases serving only 30 per cent of demand. The cities do not suffocate on their solid wastes because of the informal system that collects and recycles all recyclable materials at very low cost. This activity also generates jobs and provides economic benefits to waste collectors on the one hand and to households who can sell part of their solid waste to waste collectors rather than throw it away. Thus, glass, plastic, paper and metal are all recycled.

However, the recycling processes used are primitive and environmentally damaging. Thus, many city governments have tried to restrict them rather than taking a more positive view and helping to improve the processes through research, credit and technical advice. In some cases, state agencies have formalised the process through contractual arrangement for disposal of recyclable material.

Solid waste management has now become a global issue. Various technological options have been tried and experimented by different actors to find viable alternatives for appropriate disposal of waste. These experiments have significantly established the fact that solid waste management is not just a technical issue, nor a purely financial outlook. Basically, it has socio-political and cultural dimensions which need solutions through imaginative policies, administrative re-orientation, institutional and organisational arrangements and informed population. It is therefore imperative to review the experiences in solid waste management in the region from various dimensions. At each stage of the cycle, four major issues come into pre-dominance. These can be grouped under policy issues, planning issues, organisational issues and partnership issues, and are developped in this study through experimental cases.