Any waste that does not go up the stake or down the drain is solid waste. It is useless, unwanted or discarded material of industrial production and consumption. Solid waste which arises in association with diverse human activities is a major threat to the sustainable utilisation of natural resources - air, water, soil, and natural scenery. Sustainable utilisation means using renewable resources in a manner that does not eliminate of degrade them or otherwise diminish their renewable usefulness for future generations while maintaining effectively constant stocks of natural resources.
The increasing quantity of solid waste is a serious environmental problem in Sagarmatha National Park, Khumbu, showing that even high altitude areas of Nepal are faced with pollution dilemma. Tourists - trekkers, mountaineers, and others - dispose tins, cans, bottles, plastic bags, and papers on trails and campsites. Similarly lodges and hotels dispose such unwanted materials in the vicinity and pollute the environment. As a result, all the trekking routes and the camping areas from Namche (3,440m) to Everest Base Camp (5,356m) are littered. Because of such visual pollution, the tourist route from Lamosangu to Namche was nickname the 'garbage trail'. However no studies or surveys have been conducted for planning and mitigating serious problems mainly because 10 development efforts mainly concentrate in urban areas (e.g. solid waste management in Kathmandu, Patan and Bhaktapur) which are increasing in size and number; 20 lack of environmental awareness and public participation; and 3) lack of understanding of the complex mountain ecosystem and long-term impact of tourism of the sustainability of the whole system. Therefore, the main objective of the study was to investigate and document the nature and extent of solid wastes generated in Sagarmatha National Park. Guiding questions of the investigations were: What were the major sources of solid wastes? What were their major types and composition? What were the spatial and temporal pattern of their distribution? How extensive (concentration) was the solid waste pollution? What was the long term ecological problems and their solutions for the sustainable use of high altitude natural resources?
