Ricerc@Sapienza

This article proposes a new economic efficiency indicator for measuring and analyzing the income opportunities
for companies operating in the collection, transport and treatment of municipal solid waste, while also taking
into account the environmental perspective. Specifically, the followed approach is based on a mixed economic
and environmental perspective, with a focus on the income advantage stemming from the exploitation of secondary
raw materials obtained from differentiated waste. To pursue this scope, an indicator at the company level
is preliminarily identified; then, a systemic indicator is introduced by implementing an aggregation of the individual
ones. The adopted methodological tool is of the rank-size type, which is particularly appropriate for
inferring insights at the system level from empirical data at single company level. To validate the indicator and
apply it to real data in the sector of interest, an empirical analysis is conducted on a group of Italian waste
management companies. It is shown that the indicator can be a useful tool for generating valuable information
for waste management companies and policy-makers, who are responsible for defining policies and programs
that make the overall waste management system more sustainable, thus materializing environmental and social
benefits.