Evaluating and managing interactive barriers for sustainable e-waste management in China

E-waste, also known as waste electrical and electronic equipment, has become one of the fastest growing waste streams worldwide. As the world’s largest e-waste processing country, China’s e-waste management practice is facing multiple barriers to meet the requirement of sustainability from the economic, environmental and social perspectives. With an empirical study on the e-waste management practice of a major province in Western China, this paper develops an integrated planning approach for evaluating and managing the barriers which have mutual influence on their impact on the e-waste management practice. In consideration of interactive relationships of the barriers, a barrier assessment process is developed to assess the direct and indirect impacts of the barriers on the sustainable e-waste management practice in terms of economic, environmental and social sustainability criteria. A strategic planning process is proposed to categorise the barriers into four planning zones based on their overall impact and mitigation level. This paper contributes to e-waste management research by providing a structured approach for managing interactive barriers to achieve sustainable e-waste management. The proposed approach represents a methodological contribution to multicriteria evaluation research involving sustainability criteria and interactive alternatives.