Old televisions and computers containing hazardous substances are still being exported from Europe despite a ban aimed at stopping the trade, which poisons workers at makeshift recycling plants in Africa and Asia.
Instead of proceeding to Ivory Coast, these goods will be impounded, checked and most likely sent back to Germany, from where they arrived.
This is the front line of the European effort to stop electronic and electrical equipment, consumed and discarded in ever greater quantities, from being dumped in the developing world.It is a daunting task.
An unknown number of containers slip through, or are directed to European ports with fewer controls.
What is e-waste?
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- E-waste includes TVs, telephones, computers, white goods, and everyday household electrical items from toasters to toys
- Circuit boards are prized as scrap, because they contain gold, silver, copper and other elements
- These can only be retrieved safely with specialised recycling procedures
- 'Backyard recycling' may expose people to lead and mercury, dioxins from burning plastic, and hazardous leaching agents such as cyanide
"The fundamental problem with electronics is that it's designed in a very bad way," says Kim Schoppink, a campaigner at the Dutch branch of Greenpeace who travelled to Ghana to look at the issue in 2008.
"That makes it very expensive to recycle in Europe and therefore it's dumped in developing countries."
The e-waste contains valuable metals, which are extracted at informal recycling sites.
But it also contains toxic heavy metals and hazardous chemicals that are handled by workers, some of them children.
"They take some copper and aluminium and the rest they burn," says Ms Schoppink.
"With this burning process a lot of toxic chemicals are released and these workers are exposed to that every day."
Children commonly dismantle e-waste by hand in West Africa
In 1994 the European Community adopted the convention, which bans the export of hazardous waste to anywhere outside the OECD grouping of mostly developed countries.
It is meant to complement EU rules encouraging the collection and recycling of e-waste within Europe according to fixed environmental standards.
But by the EU's own admission, its rules are only partially effective. Just one-third of e-waste is thought to be treated in line with the bloc's Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive
Ghana is one of the countries that is drowning in the toxic waste of the developing countries, despite a number of conventions aimed at preventing the indiscriminate exports and dumping of e- waste by the industrialised countries, the problem is increasing, ship-loads of e-waste mainly poisonous mountains of old cathode ray television sets, computer monitors, fridges and other electronic goods from the US and Europe arrive at the ports of Ghana on daily basis to dump their lethal cargo which is then scavenged by children who break down the electronics and burn other components to recover valuable metals that they can sell.
ReplyDeleteIt is urgent that the industrialized countries put in place the necessary checks and balances or systems to curb the increasing illicit shipments of electronic waste from their countries and their subsequent dumping in Ghana and other countries lest developing countries continue to wallow in environmental decline, ill-health and increasing poverty.
Everyone has the right to live in a world free from toxic pollution and environmental degradation, it is important that we safeguard human health and the vitality and productivity of the environment.
We see the need for stronger awareness and action to solve the e-waste problem.
We want better enforcement of recycling and anti-dumping laws and greater action from manufacturers.
Please see this link below for more on the e-waste situation in Ghana.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/E-Waste-Watch-Ghana/128902477153239
You're absolutely right, Grace!Those who have the power of decision must stop this illegal e-waste dumping on poor countries that aren't strong enough to do it by themselves.
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