solidwastekampala

The solidwastekampala package provides the household-level data behind the manuscript “Quantity and Composition of Domestic Solid Waste in Kampala City as Influenced by Socio-Economic Factors” (Katukiza et al., Makerere University). Over a seven-day measurement campaign, the study team weighed the domestic solid waste generated by 103 households in three Kampala parishes selected to represent different income levels: Bwaise I (low), Bukoto I (middle), and Ggaba (high). Each record combines the measured mass of ten waste categories with derived per-household metrics and the socio-economic characteristics of the household and its dwelling. The package contains one analysis-ready dataset together with a full variable dictionary.

Installation

You can install the development version of solidwastekampala from GitHub with:

# install.packages("devtools")
devtools::install_github("openwashdata/solidwastekampala")

## Run the following code in console if you don't have the packages
## install.packages(c("dplyr", "knitr", "readr", "stringr", "gt", "kableExtra"))
library(dplyr)
library(knitr)
library(readr)
library(stringr)
library(gt)
library(kableExtra)

Alternatively, you can download the individual datasets as a CSV or XLSX file from the table below.

1. Click Download CSV. A window opens that displays the CSV in your browser.
2. Right-click anywhere inside the window and select “Save Page As…”.
3. Save the file in a folder of your choice.

dataset	CSV	XLSX
solidwastekampala	Download CSV	Download XLSX

Data

The package provides access to one dataset with the waste measurements and socio-economic characteristics of the 103 analyzed households.

library(solidwastekampala)

solidwastekampala

The dataset solidwastekampala contains the mass of ten waste categories collected from each household over a seven-day period, the derived per-household metrics (total, per-day, per-capita, volume, and density), and the socio-economic characteristics of the household and its dwelling. It has 103 observations and 37 variables.

solidwastekampala |> 
  head(3) |> 
  gt::gt() |>
  gt::as_raw_html()

id	household_id	division	parish	zone	income_level	occupants	age_head	gender_head	education_head	profession_head	monthly_income_ugx	respondent	period_of_stay	occupancy	housing_quality	roof_material	wall_material	floor_material	water_access	sanitation_facility	road_condition	waste_food_kg	waste_garden_kg	waste_wood_kg	waste_textiles_kg	waste_paper_kg	waste_polythene_kg	waste_plastics_kg	waste_glass_kg	waste_metals_kg	waste_other_kg	waste_total_kg	waste_per_day_kg	waste_per_capita_kg	volume_l	density_kg_l
1	Household_1	Kawempe	Bwaise I	Lubagge	low	3	18-35	Male	Secondary	Business	<500,000	Spouse	1-3 years	Rented	Bungalow	Iron sheets/tiles	Bricks	Cemented	Yard tap	Shared facilities	Unpaved	6.99	0.094	0	0.027	0.017	0.077	0.077	0	0	0.042	7.324	1.0462857	0.3487619	10	0.4740000
2	Household_2	Kawempe	Bwaise I	Lubagge	low	7	36-60	Male	Illiterate	Business	500,000-1,000,000	Son/daughter	>5 years	Occupied by owner	Bungalow	Iron sheets/tiles	Bricks	Tiles	Yard tap	Not shared facilities	Unpaved	12.43	0.000	0	0.041	0.300	0.217	0.138	0	0	0.000	13.126	1.8751429	0.2678776	30	0.4375333
3	Household_3	Kawempe	Bwaise I	Lubagge	low	6	36-60	Female	Secondary	Business	500,000-1,000,000	Household head	>5 years	Occupied by owner	Bungalow	Iron sheets/tiles	Bricks	Tiles	Yard tap	Shared facilities	Unpaved	0.00	0.000	0	0.000	0.000	4.560	0.000	0	0	0.000	4.560	0.6514286	0.1085714	12	0.3800000

For an overview of the variable names, see the following table.

variable_name	variable_type	description
id	integer	Package-level unique household identifier (1-103), following the row numbering of the All_data sheet in the raw workbook (Bwaise I, then Bukoto I, then Ggaba).
household_id	character	Household label as recorded on the area sheet (for example Household_7); values repeat across parishes and contain gaps, so id is the unique key.
division	character	Kampala City division the household is located in (Kawempe, Makindye, or Nakawa).
parish	character	Study parish the household is located in (Bwaise I = low income, Bukoto I = middle income, Ggaba = high income area).
zone	character	Administrative zone within the parish where the household is located.
income_level	c(“ordered”, “factor”)	Income level of the household’s study area as classified in the study design; ordered factor with levels low < middle < high.
occupants	integer	Number of people living in the household during the 7-day waste collection period.
age_head	c(“ordered”, “factor”)	Age of the household head in years; ordered factor with levels 18-35 < 36-60 < >60.
gender_head	character	Gender of the household head (Female or Male).
education_head	c(“ordered”, “factor”)	Highest education level of the household head; ordered factor with levels Illiterate < Primary < Secondary < Tertiary.
profession_head	character	Profession of the household head (Business, Government employee, Housewife, Private employee, or Retired).
monthly_income_ugx	c(“ordered”, “factor”)	Monthly household income band in Uganda shillings (UGX); ordered factor with levels <500,000 < 500,000-1,000,000 < 1,000,000-3,000,000 < >3,000,000.
respondent	character	Household member who answered the questionnaire (Household head, Spouse, Son/daughter, or Niece/nephew).
period_of_stay	c(“ordered”, “factor”)	How long the household has lived at the premises; ordered factor with levels <1 year < 1-3 years < 3-5 years < >5 years.
occupancy	character	Occupancy status of the premises (Occupied by owner or Rented).
housing_quality	character	Type of dwelling as a proxy for housing quality (Bungalow, Story building, or Temporary).
roof_material	character	Main roof material of the dwelling (Cemented, Iron sheets, Iron sheets/tiles, or Tiles); Bwaise I recorded only the combined Iron sheets/tiles category.
wall_material	character	Main wall material of the dwelling (Bricks, Concrete blocks, or Mud/poles).
floor_material	character	Main floor material of the dwelling (Cemented, Mud, or Tiles).
water_access	character	Main drinking water access of the household (House connection, Stand pipe, or Yard tap).
sanitation_facility	character	Whether the household’s sanitation facility is shared with other households (Shared facilities or Not shared facilities).
road_condition	character	Condition of the access road to the household (Paved or Unpaved).
waste_food_kg	numeric	Mass of food waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_garden_kg	numeric	Mass of garden waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_wood_kg	numeric	Mass of wood waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_textiles_kg	numeric	Mass of textile waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_paper_kg	numeric	Mass of paper waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_polythene_kg	numeric	Mass of polythene waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_plastics_kg	numeric	Mass of plastic waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_glass_kg	numeric	Mass of glass waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_metals_kg	numeric	Mass of metal waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category); for Ggaba Household_7 the value 2.674 was stored as text in the raw sheet and is excluded from that household’s recorded waste_total_kg.
waste_other_kg	numeric	Mass of waste not covered by the other nine categories, generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms (ASTM waste category).
waste_total_kg	numeric	Total mass of waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in kilograms, as recorded in the raw sheet (SUM of the ten category columns).
waste_per_day_kg	numeric	Mean daily mass of waste generated by the household, in kilograms per day (waste_total_kg divided by 7).
waste_per_capita_kg	numeric	Mean daily mass of waste generated per household member, in kilograms per person per day (waste_per_day_kg divided by occupants).
volume_l	numeric	Volume of the waste generated by the household over the 7-day collection period, in litres.
density_kg_l	numeric	Bulk density of the generated waste, in kilograms per litre; multiply by 1000 for kg/m3 as reported in the manuscript.

Example

The example reproduces the headline figures of the manuscript: mean per-capita waste generation and mean waste density by income level.

library(solidwastekampala)
library(dplyr)
library(ggplot2)

solidwastekampala |>
  group_by(income_level) |>
  summarise(
    households = n(),
    waste_kg_capita_day = round(mean(waste_per_capita_kg), 2),
    density_kg_m3 = round(mean(density_kg_l) * 1000)
  )
#> # A tibble: 3 × 4
#>   income_level households waste_kg_capita_day density_kg_m3
#>   <ord>             <int>               <dbl>         <dbl>
#> 1 low                  39                0.43           368
#> 2 middle               32                0.53           571
#> 3 high                 32                0.98           325

The figure boxplot-per-capita below shows the distribution behind those means: per-capita waste generation rises with the income level of the study area, from 0.43 kg per person per day in Bwaise I (low) to 0.98 kg in Ggaba (high), where the spread across households is also widest.

ggplot(solidwastekampala,
       aes(x = income_level, y = waste_per_capita_kg)) +
  geom_boxplot() +
  labs(
    x = "Income level of study area",
    y = "Waste generation (kg per person per day)",
    title = "Per-capita waste generation by income level"
  ) +
  theme_minimal()

License

Data are available as CC-BY.

Citation

Please cite this package using:

citation("solidwastekampala")
#> To cite package 'solidwastekampala' in publications use:
#> 
#>   Katukiza A, Niwagaba C, Feni I, Namagembe S, Semiyaga S, Batte A,
#>   Schöbitz L, Manga M (2026). "solidwastekampala: Quantity and
#>   Composition of Domestic Solid Waste in Kampala City."
#>   doi:10.5281/zenodo.21519797
#>   <https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21519797>.
#>   <https://openwashdata.github.io/solidwastekampala/>.
#> 
#> A BibTeX entry for LaTeX users is
#> 
#>   @Misc{katukiza_etall:2026,
#>     title = {solidwastekampala: Quantity and Composition of Domestic Solid Waste in Kampala City},
#>     author = {Alex Y. Katukiza and Charles B. Niwagaba and Ivan Feni and Shaluwa Namagembe and Swaib Semiyaga and Abubakar Batte and Lars Schöbitz and Musa Manga},
#>     year = {2026},
#>     doi = {10.5281/zenodo.21519797},
#>     url = {https://openwashdata.github.io/solidwastekampala/},
#>     abstract = {Domestic solid waste generation and composition data for 103 households in Kampala City, Uganda, collected over a seven-day measurement campaign in three parishes representing different income levels (Bwaise I, low income; Bukoto I, middle income; Ggaba, high income). Includes ten measured waste-category masses, derived per-household metrics, and household socio-economic characteristics. The data accompany the manuscript "Quantity and Composition of Domestic Solid Waste in Kampala City as Influenced by Socio-Economic Factors" (Katukiza et al., Makerere University).},
#>     version = {1.0.0},
#>   }