A comprehensive evaluation of eco-productivity of the municipal solid waste service in Chile

Highlights

	● Dynamic eco-efficiency of solid waste services providers was assessed.
	● Eco-productivity of Chilean municipalities improved by 1.28% per year.
	● Technical progress was the main driver of eco-productivity change.

Abstract

Moving toward a circular economy requires improvement of the economic and environmental performance of municipalities in their provision of municipal solid waste (MSW) services. Understanding performance changes over years is fundamental to support decision-making. This study employs the Luenberger-Hicks-Moorsteen productivity indicator to evaluate eco-productivity change and its drivers in the MSW sector in Chile over the years 2015–2019. The further use of decision tree and linear regression analysis allows exploration of the interaction between operating characteristics and eco-productivity estimations. The results of the eco-productivity assessment show that, although the Chilean MSW sector was still facing a transitional period, from 2015 to 2019, eco-productivity increased 1.28% per year. Gains in eco-productivity were due to technical progress and small gains in efficiency, whereas scale effect had an adverse impact. Other factors such as waste spending per inhabitant and the amount of waste collected and recycled per inhabitant had a significant impact on the eco-productivity of Chilean municipalities.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Solid waste / Eco-productivity change / Luenberger-Hick-Moorsteen / Recycled waste / Regression tree / Circular economy

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Acknowledgements

María Molinos-Senante gratefully acknowledges the financial support provided by the Chilean Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo (ANID) through Project Fondecyt Regular 1210077 and FONDAP 1523A0004.

Conflict of Interests

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Electronic Supplementary Material

Supplementary material is available in the online version of this article at https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-025-1931-9 and is accessible for authorized users.

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