Journal of Environmental Protection, 2015, 6, 308-320

Published Online April 2015 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/jep

http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jep.2015.64031

Estimation of Waste Generation and

Recycling Potential from Traditional
Market: A Case Study in Hue City, Vietnam
Yasuhiro Matsui1, Do Thi Thu Trang1, Nguyen Phuc Thanh2
1
Graduate School of Environmental and Life Science, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan
2
Hitachi Zosen Corp, Osaka, Japan
Email: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Received 12 January 2015; accepted 10 April 2015; published 13 April 2015

Copyright © 2015 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY).
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Abstract
This study was conducted to provide a detailed description of waste generation and characteris-
tics from a traditional market in Hue city, located in central Vietnam. The authors conducted a
waste generation survey and a waste composition survey for 309 stalls/vendors in five markets by
17 business categories for 10 consecutive days. The waste generation rates by stall/vendor and by
floor area were assessed in three waste categories: general waste, recyclable, and food residues.
The general waste that would be sent to a landfill site was classified into 10 physical categories
and 77 sub-categories. For general waste, food waste accounted for the largest part, followed by
plastic and grass. By multiplying the waste generation rate by stall/vendor by the total number of
stall/vendors in 23 markets, the authors estimated the total amounts of general waste, recyclable,
food residue and total waste by business category. The total waste generated from market was
17.0 tons/day, of which 4.6 tons (27.1%) were collected by pig farmers for feeding livestock and
0.6 tons (3.6%) were sold to the recycling market. The composting potential accounted for 55.2%
of total waste generation from the traditional market in Hue. The recycling potential accounted for
5.1%. The total disposal amount sent to the landfill site would be reduced from 69.2% to 8.8% of
the total. The 95% confidence interval (CI) of total waste amount from 23 markets was also esti-
mated using Monte Carlo simulation based on the mean and standard error of the waste genera-
tion rate. The range of 95% CI was 14.9 - 18.9 tons/day.

Keywords
Traditional Market, Recycling Potential, Composting Potential

How to cite this paper: Matsui, Y., Trang, D.T.T. and Thanh, N.P. (2015) Estimation of Waste Generation and Recycling Po-
tential from Traditional Market: A Case Study in Hue City, Vietnam. Journal of Environmental Protection, 6, 308-320.
http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jep.2015.64031
 Y. Matsui et al.

1. Introduction
In economically developing countries, the amount of municipal solid waste is approaching the capacity of exist-
ing waste facilities. It is impossible to continue waste disposal that is heavily dependent on landfill. Central and
local governments must develop solid waste management (SWM) plans that include waste reduction and recy-
cling.
Municipal solid waste is a growing problem in Vietnam, which is showing rapid economic growth year by
year. Vietnam produces over 15 million tons of municipal solid waste each year from various sources. More
than 80% (12.8 million tons/yr) derives from municipal sources: households, restaurants, markets, and business-
es [1]. As the first step in designing integrated waste management systems, it is indispensable to ascertain de-
tailed and reliable information related to waste generation, waste composition, and waste streams [2]. However,
Vietnam lacks reliable and detailed data related to SWM. The latest report on SWM in Vietnam published in
2011 presented information related to overall waste generation and physical composition of MSW around Viet-
nam, but did not clarify details related to waste generation from different sources or details related to waste
composition such as recycling or composting potential.
Regarding the municipal solid waste sources, traditional markets are known to be a considerable source of
waste generation in economically developing countries. One earlier study [3] found that markets contributed
about 20% of total waste generation in Indonesia. According to the Vietnam Retail Association, traditional
markets still constitute the major channel of the retail sector. About 8550 traditional markets existed in Vietnam
in 2011. However, few studies have specifically examined wastes from traditional markets. In Lao PDR, Byer et
al. [4] surveyed one early morning market (EMM), and clarified the waste generation rate by six business cate-
gories: fruits and vegetables, packaged goods, meat/fish/eggs, food stalls, noodles and blood, rice, and charcoal.
They assessed the physical composition, but reported no potential for recycling and composting. In Cambodia
and Vietnam, two surveys [5] [6] have assessed the waste generation rate by the total waste amount divided by
the total number of stalls in target market, but they did not address differences in waste generation rates among
business categories.
This study was undertaken to present a detailed description of waste generation and characteristic of tradi-
tional market in Hue city, Vietnam. The authors chose five markets from three market classes, and allocated the
targets by 17 business categories considering “The System of Economic Branches of Vietnam”. The authors also
estimated the total waste amount, the recycling and composting potentials from all markets in Hue as the basis
of rational SWM planning including waste reduction and recycling.

2. Methodology
2.1. Research Area and Target Traditional Markets
Hue city, the latest imperial capital of Vietnam under the Nguyen dynasty, is located in the central region of
Vietnam [7]. Hue city comprises 27 wards with area of 71.69 km2 and a population of 350,345 people. There are
two distinct seasons in Hue city: the dry season comes with the hot southwest wind for four months during
April-August; the rainy season comes with high and unevenly distributed rainfall during September-March [8].
Regarding solid waste management, the amount of collected waste in Hue city is reported as approximately
210 tons/day. The general collection rate in the whole city was about 89%, and 90% - 95% in urban areas [9].
Hue city has 23 traditional markets with different scales. According to Government Decree No. 2/2003/NĐ-
CP [10] on market development and management, 23 markets in Hue city are classified into three classes in
terms of their scale, trade volume, and facility conditions. Among them, 3 markets belong to the first class, 6
markets belong to second class, and 14 markets belong to the third class. Markets sell widely diverse items such
as food, vegetable, meat, clothes, and household equipment. There are businesses of two types in Hue, defined
as follows.
 Stall: a shop selling goods at a designated place with a contract for a certain period of time, normally lo-
cated inside a market building
 Vendor: someone who is selling goods without contract for a certain period of time, normally located out-
side of market building
Stalls and vendors in markets generate waste of many kinds such as rubbish from commodities, containers
and packaging. Some of them separate recyclable items for recycling markets and food residues for animal feed

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in Hue. For this study, the authors chose Tay Loc market from first class, Vy Da and Xep markets from second
class, and Phuoc Vinh and Thong markets from third class as the target considering location and scale. An out-
line of the five markets is shown in Table 1. Markets have widely diverse business categories. Prime Minister of
the Government of Vietnam (VPM, 2007) issued “The System of Economic Branches of Vietnam” [11] and de-
fined the business category in 642 branches. By referring the official definition, the authors defined 17 business
categories for market as shown in Table 2. For target selection, the authors allocated target kiosks and vendors
to cover 17 business categories. The total number of samples is shown in Table 2.

2.2. Outline of Survey

The authors conducted three surveys for all target samples: a waste generation survey by actual measurement, a
waste composition survey, and a questionnaire survey. Surveys on Tay Loc, Xep and Phuoc Vinh market were
conducted during 3 - 12 September. Surveys on Vy Da and Thong market were conducted during 9 - 17 Sep-
tember. The waste generation survey was administered to acquire data on the amount of waste generation for 10
consecutive days. Of them, the first three days were spent for practice; the authors used the data for the latter
seven consecutive days. The target stalls and vendors were requested to keep their waste in three categories by
their original customs: “Recyclables”, “Food residues” and “General waste”, defined as follows.
 Recyclables: items kept for recycling or sale to informal sectors or given to somewhere/someone by owners.
 Food residues: waste items kept for livestock (e.g. pigs) feeding; generally collected by livestock breeders.
 General waste: all remaining waste items excluding separated waste items described above. This type of
waste is collected daily by an environmental company in Hue (HEPCO).

Table 1. Outline of five target markets.

Name Tay Loc Vy Da Xep Phuoc Vinh Thong

Market class 1st 2nd 2nd 3rd 3rd
Number of cleanings 4 2 1 2 1
Number of stalls 682 280 365 179 112
Number of vendors 168 21 75 34 3-5
Number of target samples 91 66 63 58 30

Table 2. Definition of business category.

ID Business category
1 Rice & powder
2 Meat and meat products
3 Chicken & Duck
4 Eggs
5 Fish & fish products
6 Vegetable
7 Betel and areca
8 Fruits
9 Coconut
10 Spice, Grocery, Cakes & candy
11 Food stalls
12 Beverages
13 Textiles, apparel, footwear
14 Fresh flowers, ornamental plants
15 Daily commodity, incense, porcelain
16 Service (hair cutting, foot repairing)
17 Recyclable, Second-hand clothes

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A waste composition survey was also conducted during the survey period. To provide information related to
the recycling and composting potentials, the authors analysed details of the waste composition of “General
waste” for some representative targets. The waste was classified into 10 physical categories and 77 sub-catego-
ries. The classification categories were based on Materials (Plastic, Paper, Kitchen waste, Rubber & Leather,
Grass, Textile, Metal, Glass, Ceramic, and Miscellaneous), Types (Container/Packaging, Product and Other), Re-
cycling potential (recyclable and non-recyclable), and Composting potential (compostable and non-composta-
ble). The recycling potential was defined based on the practical trading status of recycling market in Hue city.
Recyclable items contained plastic, paper, glass, metal, and textiles that can be bought and sold at a recycling
market. The composting potential was defined based on the acceptable items of some composting plants. Or-
ganic wastes are divisible into compostable and non-compostable wastes. Compostable items consisted of vege-
tables, food residue, grass, leaves, flowers, egg shells, fish bones, fruit, and fruit skins. Non-compostable items
consisted of coconut shells, hard bones of animal, seashells, bamboos, large tree branches, and wood products.
In this study, non-recyclable items were all items that could not be recycled or composted. Descriptions of waste
classification categories are presented in Table 3. The authors also administered a questionnaire survey to assess
attributes and the current status of businesses of target stalls and vendors.

2.3. Analytical Procedure

The authors calculated key statistics related to waste generation rates by business category. The authors also as-
sessed the mean difference among market classes using analysis of variance (ANOVA). The waste composition
by percentage (%) was calculated according to the physical category and by recycling and composting poten-
tials.
By multiplying the waste generation rate by stall/vendors by total number of stall/vendors in Hue, the authors
estimated the total waste generation amount from traditional market in Hue. The authors also calculated the 95%
confidence interval of total waste generation amount from a Monte Carlo simulation (100,000 times) based on
the mean and standard error of waste generation rate by business category. Monte Carlo simulations are used
widely to assess error propagation for model parameters [12]. The authors inferred the sensitivity as a percen-
tage of the contribution from each parameter to the variance of the final result [13].

3. Results and Discussion

3.1. Waste Generation Rate of Traditional Markets
3.1.1. Waste Generation Rate by Stall/Vendor
The waste generation rates of traditional market were calculated using business categories. Table 4 presented
the mean and standard deviation of waste generation rate (g/stall/day) of stall in three market classes. Regarding
the waste generation rate by business category, “Vegetable”, “Fruits”, “Beverage” and “Fresh flowers” were
higher in all wastes, whereas “Rice”, “Meat”, “Service” and “Second-hand shop” were identified as having low-
er generation rates. The result resembled that reported from a previous study by Byer et al. [4]. They reported
that “Fruits and vegetables” generated the largest amount (6.49 kg/day) because of their high moisture contents.
Regarding fresh items that are easily be perishable after 1 - 2 days under normal conditions such as “Meat &
meat product”, “Chicken & duck”, “Fish & fish product”, “Vegetable”, “Fruit”, “Fresh flowers”, the category of
“Meat & meat product” generated the smallest amount with 289 (g/stall/day), whereas the other categories gen-
erated much higher waste amounts. In the category of “Vegetable” and “Fruit”, even though the total waste
amount was rather large, the amounts of food residues were quite small because the rotten or leftover vegetables
and fruits were normally unsuitable for feeding animals. Conversely, the categories of “Chicken & duck”, “Fish
& fish product” generated a large amount of food residues because these categories had processing services on
site. Therefore, normally the internal organs and unnecessary parts were separated as food residues.
Some dry-food items such as “Rice/powder” and “Spice and grocery” produced smaller amounts with 110 and
759 (g/stall/day), respectively. Regarding food services, “Food stalls” & “Beverage” respectively produced sim-
ilar total waste amounts, with 3525 and 3323 (g/stall/day). However, “Beverage” generated small amounts of
food residues, whereas a major amount of wastes in “Food stalls” were food residues. Table 4 also shows that
some business categories such as “Meat”, “Chicken & Duck”, “Fish”, “Vegetable”, and “Fresh flowers” did not
separate recyclables. Table 5 presents the mean and standard deviation of waste generation rate (g/vendor/day)

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Table 3. Classification category of waste from market.

Recycling Recycling
Category Code Details Category Code Details
potential potential
1. Plastic 5. Grass and wood
101 PET bottle Re Container & 503 Containers & packaging Co
Container & 102 Other plastic bottle Re Packaging 503* Containers & packaging NRe
Packaging
Products and
103 Tray Re 504 Grass and wood products Co
Others
103* Tray NRe 504* Grass and wood products NRe
104 Tube Re 6. Textile
104* Tube NRe 601 Clothes Re
105 Other shape Re 602 Daily commodities NRe
105* Other shape NRe 603 Disposed commodities NRe
106 Shopping plastic bags Re 604 Other product Re
107* Other plastic packaging NRe 7. Metal
108 Other C & P (e.g.: buffer) Re 701 Containers Re
*
108 Other C & P NRe 702 Other containers and packaging Re
109 Plastic product Re Aluminum 702* Other containers and packaging NRe
Product
109* Plastic product NRe 703 Products and others Re
*
110 Other plastics Re 703 Products and others NRe
Other plastics
110* Other plastics NRe 704 Containers Re
2. Paper 704* Containers NRe
Steel
201 Carton Re 705 Other containers and packaging Re
202 Containers Re 706 Products and others Re
Container & 203 Cardboard Re Stainless 707 Products and others Re
Packaging
204 Packaging Re Lead 707* Products and others NRe
205 Other C & P Re 708 Other metals Re
Other metals *
206 Newspaper/poster Re 708 Other metals NRe
207 Books Re 8. Glass
208 Notebooks Re 801 Returnable bottle Re
209 Photocopy Re Container 802 Disposal bottle Re
Product
210 Disposal paper products NRe 803 Other containers Re
*
210 Nappies/Diapers NRe Products and 804 Thermometers, Fluorescent lamp NRe
211 Other paper product Re others 805 Products and others NRe
211* Other paper product NRe 9. Ceramic
212 Other Paper Re 901 Containers NRe
Other Paper
212* Other Paper NRe 902 Products and others NRe
3. Kitchen waste 10. Miscellaneous
Compostable 301 Kitchen waste Co 1001 Combustibles NRe
301* Coconut/Durian shells NRe 1002 Liquids_edible Re
Non-compostable *
302 Hard bones of animal NRe 1002 Liquids_inedible NRe
4. Rubber and leather 1003 Incombustibles (excluding ash) NRe
401 Rubber and leather NRe 1004 Ash NRe
5. Grass and wood 1005 Medical care syringe, needle, …) NRe
501 Garden waste Co 1006 Batteries NRe
*
Garden waste 501 Garden waste NRe 1007 E-waste NRe
502 Flower Co 1008 Others NRe
a
Re, Recyclable; Co, Compostable; NRe, Non-recyclable & non-compostable items, The recycling potential of each item was defined based on reports from two
junk-shop owners. The compostable item and non-compostable item were defined based on the acceptable items in some composting plants.

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Table 4. Waste generation rate by stall (g/stall/day).

General waste Recyclable Food residues Total waste

Category N
Mean ± Standard deviation
Rice, powder 6 89 ± 89 8 ± 20 13 ± 31 110 ± 95
Meat/meat product 13 268 ± 305 - 20 ± 40 289 ± 299
Chicken & duck 12 102 ± 165 - 2664 ± 3264 2766 ± 3194
Egg 4 445 ± 644 291 ± 314 - 737 ± 555
Fish & fish product 32 248 ± 269 - 2513 ± 2445 2761 ± 2486
Vegetable 40 4893 ± 5525 - 250 ± 727 5143 ± 5657
Betel & areca 2 1138 ± 597 140 ± 37 - 1278 ± 634
Fruit 31 3865 ± 2921 520 ± 853 184 ± 1023 4568 ± 3343
Spice & Grocery 37 392 ± 866 149 ± 301 218 ± 939 759 ± 1342
Food stall 21 762 ± 717 9 ± 42 2754 ± 3594 3525 ± 3801
Beverages 10 2829 ± 3023 170 ± 271 324 ± 1023 3323 ± 2955
Textiles & Apparel 16 195 ± 157 43 ± 166 - 238 ± 242
Fresh flowers 11 3209 ± 4009 - - 3209 ± 4009
Daily commodity 18 271 ± 283 182 ± 514 - 453 ± 566
Service 14 190 ± 114 8 ± 27 - 198 ± 116
Second-hand shop 4 292 ± 491 124 ± 152 - 416 ± 409

Table 5. Waste generation rate by vendor (g/vendor/day).

General waste Recyclable Food residues Total waste

Category N
Mean ± Standard deviation
Rice, powder_vendor 1 268 - - 268
Egg_vendor 2 412 ± 197 - - 412 ± 197
Fish & fish product_vendor 2 - - 1628 ± 462 1628 ± 462
Vegetable_vendor 11 3918 ± 3117 - 88 ± 212 4006 ± 3039
Betel and areca_vendor 2 4226 ± 4848 - - 4226 ± 4848
Fruit_vendor 7 1811 ± 1911 71 ± 123 - 1882 ± 1867
Coconut_vendor 2 91801 ± 1040 - - 91801 ± 1040
Spice & Grocery_vendor 3 291 ± 375 - - 291 ± 375
Food stall_vendor 5 493 ± 418 - 876 ± 1206 1369 ± 868
Textiles & Apparel_vendor 1 23 - - 23
Fresh flowers_vendor 2 1451 ± 84 - - 1451 ± 84

of vendors in three market classes. The “Coconut_vendor” category was separated from “Fruit_vendor” because
the waste generation rate of “Coconut_vendor” was extremely high, with 91,801 g/day, which was much higher
than that of “Fruit_vendor” with 1882 g/vendor/day.
Comparing the waste generation rate of a stall with that of a vendor, some categories with higher waste gen-
eration rates such as “Fish & fish product”, “Vegetable_vendor”, “Fruit”, “Food stall” and “Fresh flowers”, the
waste generation rate of a stall was higher than that of a vendor. That result is explainable that the space and
business scale of vendors were normally smaller than those of stalls; the resultant waste generation rate was
lower. The vendors did not separate recyclables in most business categories excluding “Fruit_vendor”; the food

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residue amount was small excluding “Fish_vendor” and “Food_vendor” as stalls, probably because they had
insufficient space to keep such wastes.

3.1.2 Waste Generation Rate by Floor Area

In the traditional market, the stall areas differ among market classes and business categories. The authors calcu-
lated the waste generation rate by floor area for two markets for which the managers of markets provided the
official data on floor area of each stall, Tay Loc as a first class market and Xep as a second class market. Table
6 presents the means and standard deviations of waste generation rate of 17 business categories by floor area
(g/m2/day) in two markets. The floor areas in most business categories in the first class market were larger than
those of the second class market. For “Rice & powder”, “Fish & fish product”, “Vegetable”, “Spice & Grocery”,
“Beverage”, “Textile & Apparel”, “Fresh Flowers”, “Daily commodity” and “Service” categories, the waste
generation rate of total waste by square meter was higher for the first class market than for the second class
market. For “Meat & meat product”, “Fruit” and “Food stall” categories, the waste generation rate of total
waste by square meter was higher for the second class market, but the waste generation rate of total waste by
stall was higher for the first class market.
In most of business categories, the stalls in first class market discharged more waste than those in the second
class. In the first class market, no stalls existed for “Egg” and “Betel & areca” categories. These items were sold
only at vendors in the first class market. Regarding the “Chicken & duck” category, the waste generation rate of
total waste by square meter in the first class market was 178 g/m2/day, which was much lower than that in the
second class market at 2090 g/m2/day. By the observation in both markets, the difference noted above can be
explained by the habit of stall owner in keeping internal organs of “Chicken & duck” in each market. In the first
class market, the owners generally separated internal organs and sold them to customers, whereas the owners in
the second class market normally put internal organs into containers as food residues for livestock breeders and
occasionally sold them to customers upon request.

Table 6. Waste generation rate by floor area.

Tay Loc Xep

Category Area GW Re FR Total Area GW Re FR Total
2 2 2 2
m g/m /day m g/m /day
Rice & powder 3.2 42 ± 24 8 ± 11 - 49 ± 34 1.69 1 1 - 2

Meat & meat product 2 250 ± 247 - - 250 ± 247 1.69 272 ± 266 - - 272 ± 266

Chicken & duck 3.6 - - 178 ± 7 178 ± 7 2.25 40 ± 63 - 2050 ± 1670 2090 ± 1622

Egg - - - - - 2.25 338 ± 408 167 ± 189 - 505 ± 218

Fish & fish product 3.6 126 ± 115 - 1209 ± 913 1335 ± 940 1.69 163 ± 164 - 739 ± 925 903 ± 861
Vegetable 3.6 - 10.8 2274 ± 1531 - 49 ± 63 2324 ± 1518 1.69 - 3.38 964 ± 575 - 78 ± 100 1042 ± 557
Betel & areca - - - - - 2.25 693 74 - 767

Fruit 3.6 1248 ± 857 - - 1248 ± 857 1.69 - 3.38 1362 ± 886 402 ± 625 211 ± 596 1975 ± 1288

Spice & Grocery 2 - 6.4 73 ± 47 80 ± 129 - 153 ± 159 2.25 - 4.5 23 ± 12 73 ± 90 - 96 ± 86

Food stall 3.6 - 7.2 199 ± 207 - 1085 ± 1030 1283 ± 949 2.25 - 4.5 353 ± 351 14 ± 35 1252 ± 2149 1619 ± 2464

Beverages 3.6 2095 ± 235 69 ± 11 - 2163 ± 246 2.25 - 4.5 397 ± 400 147 ± 69 - 544 ± 469
Textiles & Apparel 3.6 - 12 66 ± 38 - - 66 ± 38 4.5 13 ± 9 - - 13 ± 9

Fresh flower 3.6 - 7.2 1224 ± 1465 - - 1224 ± 1465 2.25 - 7.29 444 ± 269 - - 444 ± 269

Daily commodity 2-4 125 ± 126 29 ± 64 - 154 ± 182 1.69 - 14.58 83 ± 70 4±7 - 88 ± 73

Service 2 - 3.6 53 ± 22 - - 53 ± 22 7.29 23 14 - 37

Second-hand shop 3.2 91 ± 153 39 ± 48 - 130 ± 128 - - - - -
GW, General waste; Re, Recyclable; FR, Food residue.

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3.2. Mean Difference in Waste Generation Rate by Market Class

Regarding comparison among three market classes, the authors assessed the mean difference in waste generation
rates among the three market classes by 17 business categories using ANOVA. The authors found significant
mean differences for “Fish” and “Vegetable”. Table 7 shows means and SDs of waste generation rates for “Fish”
and “Vegetable” by three market classes and ANOVA results. The waste generation rate was the highest in the
first class, and lower in the second class and the third class. The differences among three markets are explaina-
ble by the fact obtained from questionnaire survey that, in the first class market, the area was largest and the op-
eration time was very long, whereas the area and operation time were smaller in the second and third class mar-
kets, which can be expected to influence the amounts of sales and waste generation.

3.3. Waste Composition of Market

3.3.1. Physical Composition
The physical composition of general waste by business category is shown in Table 8. The physical composition
differs among business categories. The results indicated that food waste accounts for the largest part with sub-

Table 7. Waste generation rate by market class (g/stall/day).

Market
Category N General waste Food residues Total waste
class
1 7 452 ± 412 4352 ± 3288 4804 ± 3384
Fish & fish product 2 14 207 ± 224 1428 ± 1095 1635 ± 1018
3 11 169 ± 137 2725 ± 2533 2894 ± 2493
ANOVA (F value) 3.001 4.077* 4.74*
1 9 11785 ± 7877 340 ± 564 12125 ± 8134
Vegetable 2 14 2928 ± 2757 199 ± 358 3127 ± 2996
3 17 2863 ± 1653 245 ± 1009 3108 ± 1504
ANOVA (F value) 15.972*** 0.098 15.351***
*
p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.

Table 8. Physical composition by business category (%).

ID N Plastic Paper Food Rubber Grass Textile Metal Glass Ceramic Other
Rice, powder 6 6.8% 0.7% 52.6% 0.1% 21.5% - - - - 18.3%
Meat 15 48.2% 0.9% 44.8% - 2.9% - - - - 3.3%
Chicken & duck 2 51.8% 9.9% 24.4% 11.3% 1.5% - 1.0% - - -
Egg 7 9.4% 2.1% 67.8% - 20.5% - - - - 0.1%
Fish 30 32.6% 0.2% 45.1% - 4.7% - - - - 17.4%
Vegetable 17 2.8% 0.3% 93.2% - 1.3% - - - - 2.4%
Betel & areca 2 2.2% 0.1% 14.7% - 83% - - - - -
Fruit 14 1.6% 3.5% 81.7% 0.1% 12.7% - - - - 0.3%
Spice & Grocery 33 26.4% 14.7% 52.5% 1.6% 2.2% 0.1% 0.5% - - 2%
Food stalls 25 7.4% 8.3% 25% 0.2% 51.9% 2.9% - - - 4.3%
Beverages 8 8.1% 0.1% 77.2% - 8.6% - - - - 6.1%
Textiles & footwear 13 40% 15.1% 20.3% 21.2% - 0.7% 2.1% - - 0.5%
Fresh flowers 6 2.1% 1.7% 21.7% - 74.5% - - - - -
Daily commodity
11 10.4% 12.7% 62.3% 0.2% 3.8% 2.3% 0.1% - 8.0% 0.1%
Daily commodity
Service 5 30.1% 2.4% 31.6% 0.1% 2.4% 11.6% 0.8% - - 21%
Second-hand shop 2 29.0% 69.5% - - - - - - - 1.4%

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sequent plastic or grass. The proportions of food waste were high, with 93.2%, 81.7% and 77.2%, respectively,
in “Vegetable”, “Fruit” and “Beverage”. Previous reports have described that the major portion of solid waste in
market is food waste and other organic matter. A survey conducted in Danang [6] reported that the organic part
accounted for 81.5%. A survey in Thailand also presented that the organic from market was 85% [14].
The categories of “Meat”, “Fish”, “Textile” and “Spice” generated plastics with higher percentage, using
mainly single-use plastic bags for packaging, whereas “Betel & areca”, “Fresh flower” and “Food stalls” cate-
gories generated grass with higher percentages. These results directly reflected the fact that some parts of “Betel
and areca” and “Fresh flower” such as stems, leaves, and un-needed parts are often removed according to re-
quests from customers. “Food stalls” generated large amounts of grass because Vietnamese people have a habit
of wrapping some foods in leaves such as banana or lotus leaves. They discard them after use. Glass was not
found in all categories, and ceramic was only found in “Daily commodity” with 8%. Rubber was found in
“Chicken & duck” because rubber bands are usually used to tie live chicken or duck legs. The “Textiles & foot-
wear” category generated some rubber because rubber pieces were often used to repair shoes.

3.3.2. Recycling and Composting Potential of Waste from Traditional Markets

Table 9 presents waste composting and recycling potentials from general waste by business category according
to the definition shown in Table 3. It is apparent that the composting potential was very high in some categories
such as “Betel & areca”, “Vegetable”, “Fruit” and “Fresh flowers”. The recycling potential was highest in the
category of “Second-hand shop” with 98.6% followed by “Textiles & apparel” with 63.6%, “Meat” with 48.9%
and “Chicken & duck” with 46.4%.

3.4. Estimation of Total Waste Generation from Traditional Market in Hue

3.4.1. Validation of General Waste at Three Markets
To validate waste generation rates in Table 4 and Table 5, the authors estimated the 95% confidence intervals
(CIs) of total amount of general waste for three target markets, Tay Loc in the first class, Xep in the second class
and Phuoc Vinh in the third class, and compared the CIs with the measured waste amounts by actual measure-
ment on site. By multiplying the waste generation rate by the stall/vendor by total number of stall/vendor in tar-
get markets, the authors calculated the total amounts of general wastes for the target markets. The 95% confi-
dence interval for each market was estimated using Monte Carlo simulation (100,000 times) based on the mean
and standard error of the waste generation rates shown in Table 4 and Table 5. Table 10 presents the 95% CIs

Table 9. Recycling and composting potential of general waste (%).

Category N Non-recyclable Recyclable Compostable

Rice/powder 6 18.1% 6.4% 75.5%
Meat 15 8.7% 48.9% 42.4%
Chicken & duck 2 26.1% 46.4% 27.5%
Egg 7 3.0% 10.5% 86.6%
Fish 30 18.0% 32.3% 49.7%
Vegetable 17 2.8% 2.9% 94.3%
Betel & areca 2 1% 1.3% 97.7%
Fruit 14 3.8% 4.1% 92.1%
Spice & Grocery 33 8.7% 37.8% 53.5%
Food stalls 25 14.4% 9.5% 76.1%
Beverages 8 6.2% 8.2% 85.7%
Textiles & footwear 13 11.9% 63.6% 24.4%
Fresh flower 6 2.7% 2.7% 94.5%
Daily commodity 11 14.5% 21.4% 64.1%
Service 5 34.6% 24.7% 40.7%
Second-hand shop 3 1.4% 98.6% 0.0%

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Table 10. Interval estimation of three markets and actual amount.

Market 95% CI of general waste (kg) Actual amount (kg)

Tay Loc market 1412 - 2163 1766
Xep market 286 - 502 473.8
Phuoc Vinh market 252 - 363 343.5

of general waste (kg/day) and the measured waste amounts in three markets. The results show that the measured
waste amounts were in the 95% CI range for the three markets.

3.4.2. Total Waste Generation from Traditional Markets

Hue city has 23 traditional markets. Because of a lack of information exists for the floor area by each business
categories in 23 markets, in this study, the author used only the number of stalls by business category as an in-
dicator for estimation the total amount of waste from traditional market in Hue. By multiplying the waste gener-
ation rate by stall/vendor by the total number of stall/vendors in 23 markets, the authors calculated the total
amount of general waste, recyclable, food residue, and total waste by business category. The general waste also
included some amount of recyclable and compostable parts, as shown in Table 8. The authors also estimated the
potentials of recycling and composting in general waste separately.
Table 11 presents details of waste generation from a traditional market in Hue: non-recyclable, recycling po-
tential, composting potential contained in general waste: recyclable, food residues, and total waste by weight
(kg/day) by business category. The total waste generation amount was 17.0 tons, of which 3.6% of waste was
separated at the source as recyclable, 69.2% was general waste, and 27.1% was food residues. In general waste,
the recycling potential accounted for 5.1%, composting potential accounted for 55.2%, and the remaining waste
accounted for only 8.8%. This result indicates that waste generation in markets has high potential up to 82.3% of
total for composting and livestock feeding.
The total disposal amount sent to the landfill site can be reduced from 69.2% to 8.8%. Regarding the “Coco-
nut” category, the waste generation rate was the highest with 91.8 kg/stall/day and was mainly composed of co-
conut shell. Therefore, we did not bring it to the laboratory to examine the composition. The authors assumed
that the total generated waste from the “Coconut” category was non-recyclable. Regarding composting potential,
“Vegetable” accounted for the largest amount with 4422 kg/day, followed by “Vegetable_vendor”, (1580 kg/day)
and “Fruit” (1520 kg/day). These results suggest that these sources would contribute immensely to promoting
waste reduction. Regarding about the recycling potential, the largest contribution category was “Spice & grocery”
with 195 kg/day, followed by “Vegetable” (135 kg/day), “Textiles & apparel” (120 kg/day), “Fish” (86 kg/day),
and “Meat” (83 kg/day). The results revealed that these categories should be considered heavily for promotion
for recycling for market. The total estimated composting potential was 9.4 tons, which contributes mostly to the
total general waste in the market. The large quantity of composting potential present in the MSW stream has a
great impact on the production of high-quality compost and offers great potential for resource recovery. Such
recovery is expected to play an important role in reducing total waste generation amount and in mitigating the
negative effects on environmental quality and natural resource conservation.

3.4.3. Interval Estimation of Total Waste Generation from Traditional Market in Hue
The 95% confidence interval (CI) of total waste amount from 23 markets was also estimated using Monte Carlo
simulation (100,000 times) based on the mean and standard error of waste generation rate shown in Table 4 and
Table 5. The results showed that the range of 95% CI was 14.9 - 18.9 tons/day.
The authors also examined the sensitivity as a percentage of the contribution from the waste generation rate of
each business category to the variance of the total waste amount. Figure 1 presents the result of sensitivity
analysis. “Vegetables of first class market” was identified as the category with the largest contribution (34.8%)
to the variance of the total waste amount, followed by “Vegetable_vendor” (13.5%) and “Fish of first class”,
(10.9%). To improve the reliability of total estimation, the sample size should be increased. Further investigation
must be undertaken to clarify the factors affecting waste generation rate in these categories.

4. Conclusions
1) This study produced a detailed description of waste generation and composition by 17 business categories

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Table 11. Waste amounts by business category from 23 markets in Hue (kg/day).

General waste
Category N Recycling Composting Recyclable Food Residues Total
Non-recyclable
potential potential
Rice & powder 220 4 1 15 2 3 24
Meat 630 15 83 72 - 13 182
Chicken & duck 75 2 4 2 - 200 208
Egg 18 0 1 7 5 - 13
Fish 1045 48 86 133 - 2737 3004
Vegetable 951 132 135 4422 - 238 4928
Betel & Areca 50 1 1 56 7 - 64
Fruit 427 63 68 1520 222 79 1951
Coconut 5 459 - - - - 459
Spice & Grocery 1315 45 195 276 196 286 998
Food stalls 265 29 19 154 2 730 934
Beverages 90 16 21 218 15 29 299
Textiles & Apparel 968 23 120 46 42 - 231
Fresh flowers 64 6 6 194 0 - 205
Equipment, watch 545 21 32 95 99 - 247
Service 181 12 9 14 2 - 36
Second-hand shop 61 0 18 0 8 - 25
Rice & powder_vendor 36 2 1 7 0 0 10
Egg_vendor 16 0 1 6 0 0 7
Fish & fish product_vendor 79 0 0 0 0 129 129
Vegetable_vendor 436 48 49 1611 0 38 1746
Betel and areca_vendor 20 1 1 83 0 0 85
Fruit_vendor 224 15 17 374 16 0 422
Coconut_vendor 6 551 0 0 0 0 551
Spice & Grocery_vendor 141 10 7 53 0 124 193
Food stall_vendor 31 0 0 0 0 0 1
Textiles & Apparel_vendor 16 1 1 22 0 0 23
Amount (kg) 1502 872 9377 616 4605 16,972
Amount (tons) 1.5 0.9 9.4 0.6 4.6 17.0
Percentage 8.8% 5.1% 55.2% 3.6% 27.1% 100%

Figure 1. Sensitivity analysis of total waste generation.

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in a traditional market in Hue city, Vietnam. In all, 309 stalls/vendors in five markets were surveyed for 10 con-
secutive days in the dry season.
2) The waste generation rate by stall/vendor was assessed by each business category by three waste categories:
general waste, recyclable, food residues. The waste generation rates of “Vegetable”, “Fruits”, “Beverage” and
“Fresh Flowers” were higher in all wastes, whereas those of “Rice”, “Meat”, “Service” and “Second-hand shop”
were identified as having lower generation rates.
3) Significant mean differences of total waste amount were found in “Fish” and “Vegetable” categories. The
waste generation rate was the highest in the first market class and lower in the second market class and third
market class.
4) The waste generation rate by floor area was also calculated in two markets in first and second classes. In
most business categories, the stalls in the first class market discharged more waste than those in the second
class.
5) The general waste was classified into 10 physical categories and 77 sub-categories. Food waste accounted
for the largest part, followed by plastic and grass. The results from sub-categories demonstrated the potential for
composting and recycling.
6) As the validation of waste generation rate, the authors estimated the 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of total
amount of general waste for three target markets and compared the CIs with the measured waste amounts by ac-
tual measurements conducted on site. The measured waste amounts were in the 95% CI range for the three mar-
kets.
7) The authors also estimated the total generated waste, the recycling and composting potential for 23 tradi-
tional markets in Hue. The total waste generated from market was 17.0 tons/day, of which 4.6 tons (27.1%) was
collected by pig farmers for feeding livestock and 0.6 tons (3.6%) was sold to the recycling market. The com-
posting potential accounted for 55.2% and the recycling potential accounted for 5.1% of total waste generation
from traditional market in Hue. The total disposal amount sent to the landfill site would be reduced from 69.2%
to 8.8% of the total.
By the Monte Carlo simulation, the confidence interval of total waste generation from traditional market in
Hue was estimated. The 95% CI of total waste was 14.9 - 18.9 tons/day. By sensitivity analysis, “Vegetable of
first class market” was identified as the category with the largest contribution to the variance of the total waste
amount with subsequent “Vegetable_vendor” and “Fish of first class”. To improve the reliability of total estima-
tion, the sample size should be increased and further investigation is necessary to clarify the factors affecting
waste generation rates in these categories.

Acknowledgements
The authors sincerely thank the staff and students from Hue University for their assistance in this study. Special
thanks to Dr. Pham Khac Lieu and Mr. Tran Ngoc Tuan who supported our survey enthusiastically. The authors
also express their appreciation to the statistical office in Hue as well as all of stall/vendor owners in five target
markets for collaborating with us.

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