European E-waste, Labeled 'Second-Hand,' Is Unloaded in Ghana
by Eliza Barclay, Nomad on 08. 7.08
Photo credit: Greenpeace/Kate Davison
We've covered the extensive electronic waste, or e-waste, problems in China, India and Mexico in the past. Now Africa is emerging as a new favorite dumping ground for our aged electronic products, and the implications for human health are disturbing.
Greenpeace is reporting that items like computer monitors, hard drives, television sets and printers from the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Germany and South Korea are ending up in Africa dumps like the one in Ghana's capital, Accra. Though in nearly all European countries it is illegal to dump e-waste because it often contains toxins like lead and chlorinated dioxins, increasingly aid groups are encouraging Europeans to send their old equipment to developing countries to be reused.
But Greenpeace learned that devious electronics traders are buying usable and obsolete machines in bulk and sending them to Africa falsely and incorrectly labeled as "second hand." Traders told Greenpeace that to get a shipping container with a few working computers they must accept broken junk like old screens in the same container from European exporters.
In Accra, the obsolete items end up in dumps and are picked apart and then burned, releasing noxious fumes and chemicals.
"Some of the samples contained toxic metals including lead in quantities as much as 100 times above levels found in uncontaminated soil and sediment samples," a Greenpeace scientist said in a statement after taking samples at open-burning sites at the dump. Greenpeace added that the chemical contamination found at the sites in Ghana was similar to that previously documented by Greenpeace for e-waste open-burning sites in China and India.
The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) says that between 20 million and 50 million tons of e-waste is now generated annually, as consumers regularly upgrade and discard old machines. In the European Union, for example, up to 75 per cent of that waste is unaccounted for, according to Greenpeace. :: Via Telegraph, Yahoo News
More on E-waste
E-waste Recycling is Serious Health Threat in China
E-Waste Gets a New Pick-Me-Up in Mumbai
How to Better Mitigate the Impact of E-Waste
Code Green, And Others, Seeking Answers to E-waste
Thirsty for more? Check out these related articles:
- Paper, Rotten Fruit Help Recover Precious Metals from e-Waste
- 60 Minutes Reporter Attacked in Chinese E-Waste Pit
- Greenpeace Goes to Africa
- E-Waste A Growing Problem in UK Landfills
Kids on Dizzywood Plant 15,000 Virtual Trees to Green Planet Earth
|
"I think I've got something in my eye"
|
Perhaps the developing nations can start salvage programs to break down the e-waste into it's base components for resale.... it provides training... jobs... income.... and will prevent the type of mess that is brewing now.
It saddens me that the absolute worst outcome is happening to weee/ewaste - ultimately, we have to slow our buying cycles down - it's the only solution.
If everybody who thought about upgrading their TV or computer - that's working OK for them - for another 6 months or a year it would have a profound effect on the amount of waste.
The green motto should be:
Not having the latest model shows I care!
I'm an e-waste recycler in Africa. Although things are only just starting to take off as far as regulation and standardization of practice goes, there's already been a lot of progress in how e-waste is being handled.
Yes - we may get loads of stuff dumped from elsewhere, but we also generate a good deal of scrap ourselves. Most of my e-waste is sourced locally - not overseas.
However, I'm in a pretty "developed" part of South Africa, and in other areas there are definitely problems we don't see here.
This disgusts me. Of course we all know there are always people willing to do anything for their own benefit, but in these countries (I'm from one of them) we have all this money, all this technology and possibilities to dispose of our waste in an environmentally responsible way, and then we allow this to happen. Shame on us.