Ritual waste as a misclassified urban waste stream: a critical scoping review of governance gaps and environmental management implications

Ritual waste is often subsumed within generic municipal waste categories despite distinctive material, cultural, and governance characteristics. This critical scoping review examines ritual waste as a potentially misclassified urban waste stream and how its management is shaped by material composition, social meaning, behavioural practices, and institutional arrangements. Following PRISMA-ScR and JBI guidance, searches in Scopus, PubMed, and Google Scholar/Publish or Perish, supplemented by citation chasing, identified 23 eligible studies. Ritual waste comprised heterogeneous biodegradable and non-biodegradable materials, while handling was influenced by sacredness, social norms, authority, convenience, facility access, and legitimacy. Reported pathways ranged from open dumping, burning, and disposal into water bodiesto segregation, composting, refuse-derived fuel , briquetting, incense production, black soldier fly processing, and bioporesystems. Governance gaps emerged where conventional waste systems failed to accommodate ritual timing, material diversity, and culturally specific handling requirements. Evidence remained geographically concentrated and methodologically heterogeneous. Ritual waste therefore becomes an environmental management challenge through misclassification, as socially significant materials are managed as ordinary waste within systems that insufficiently address symbolic and operational dimensions. Effective management requires culturally legitimate, institutionally adaptive, and coordinated approaches integrating community authority, service design, treatment options, and urban environmental policy.