Change of Plans: Lessons on Appropriate Technology from Blantyre, Malawi

“If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail.” – Abraham Maslow, 1966

My hammer was a piece of software that I developed during a semester project at the Global Health Engineering research group. It recommends schedules for emptying the waste containers around the city of Blantyre, Malawi’s second largest city. And thanks to an ETH4D Research to Action Grant, I could travel to Blantyre to gather data for the software and discuss it with the Blantyre City Council. I was hopeful that it would prevent some plastic from ending up in a river, or pests from feeding on overflowing organic waste.

However, every meeting and interaction with stakeholders on site convinced me of one thing: the model I had developed would not work. What I thought was an issue that could be solved with better scheduling turned out to be a multi-faceted problem involving communications, information management, finance, but also politics and personal interests. For instance, the main bottleneck to waste collection is not always a lack of vehicles per se. Some trash compactors and skip handlers are donated by development agencies. However, these overcomplicated machines break down quickly, and the city council cannot afford to repair them. Beyond that, fuel allowances for the functioning trucks are not managed by the public health department, and are severely constrained.

Instead of pushing a solution I developed in an office in Zurich, I took the opportunity to learn from our project partners and residents, and understand and report on the more important issues behind Blantyre’s waste management challenges. Beyond looking at the hard statistics, I looked at how the organization works, how the decisions are made, and what strategies are being implemented.

Before leaving, I also delivered some products that could actually be useful for the waste collection managers. This includes a map of the public waste infrastructure and distances between the different points of interest in the city. Hopefully, this is only the first iteration of a useful, people-centric information management system we will develop with Blantyre City Council.

What was meant to be a neatly wrapped-up project has shifted into an effort to inform decision-makers in Blantyre and at the World Bank on how to best invest in waste management in Malawi’s economic capital. And while my hammer was not the right fit, we are delving into the broader Global Health Engineering toolbox to work towards appropriate solutions to Blantyre’s waste challenges.