Hong Kong Citizens’ Socio-Demographic Dynamics of Urban Yard Waste Facilities Siting and Legislation Preferences

Abstract

The public opinions on yard waste (YW) facility siting and legislation reflect public needs and anticipations on the ways they perceive and deal with such urban yard waste, which aid to ascertain why and how people participate in YW treatment activities and support future urban yard waste policy development. However, such relevant and specific social survey on above issues remains limited, thereby scant attention has been given to the related socio-demographic explorations. This study focuses on the YW facility siting and legislation public opinions, and relevant associations across socio-demographic groups in Hong Kong, China. Data were obtained from 202 mostly cultured respondents randomly gleaned by online questionnaire survey. More than half of respondents did not reject to having the YW treatment facilities in their neighborhood. The statistical association between the opposing opinion toward having YW treatment facility near home and education level was rather strong. The majority of the tertiary-educated group expressed the strongest counter-opposition view towards YW facility within the community, while those with secondary education background had no comment. Nearly 62% of respondents supported the outlawing of direct dumping of YW to landfill, and the majority of them were cultured citizens. Decision makers should prudently consider the expressed needs and hopes of the socio-demographically differentiated subpopulations, and factor in their public opinions into the decision-making process for progressing local urban yard waste governance and overall environmental sustainability.