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  UNEP 27 Nov 06
Basel Conference Addresses Electronic Wastes Challenge

Yahoo News 26 Nov 06
UN seeks to save developing world from e-waste
by Bogonko Bosire

NAIROBI (AFP) - The United Nations has pressed for a watertight framework to save developing nations from unregulated imports of electronic wastes that release heavy metals and chemicals.

A day before experts from 120 countries gather in Kenya for a global hazardous waste conference, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said between 20 to 50 million metric tonnes of electronic wastes are generated annually in the world.

With some computers, cell phones and other gadgets going out of use within months of production, so-called e-waste is considered the fastest growing part of municipal waste in the developed world.

Most of it is shipped to the poor world, mainly Africa, under "refurbished" banner and end up in junkyards where the goods rot and release lead, canadium, mercury and other deadly compounds that pollute the environment.

In the absence of reliable figures, experts speculate that anywhere between 25 to 75 percent of the e-waste that enters Africa -- mostly through Mombasa, Lagos and Dar es Salaam ports -- is useless.

In Nigeria, about 500 containers full of used electronic cargo pass through the Lagos port every month, according to a recent study by Seattle-based Basel Action Network.

As the Basel Convention, which came into force in 1992 and has more than 160 state parties, comes up for review at a week-long conference here, governments are expected to adopt a framework to tighten shipments and disposal.

But the treaty's executive secretary, Sachiko Kuwabara-Yamamoto, said there was a need to raise awareness of the dangers posed by the explosion of electronic wastes.

"Because you only manage what you can measure, we need to shine a brighter light on hazardous wastes -- on where they come from and on where they end up," Kuwabara-Yamamoto said Sunday.

"More and better information about waste will also help us to tackle the growing challenge of illegal trade," she added, explaining that the 8th meeting of the conference of parties to the Basel convention will seek to stem the tide of exporting e-waste to the developing world.

Kenya's Environment Minister Kivutha Kibwana said that while Africa bore the brunt of e-waste, the entire world will have to face the aftermath of resultant pollution.

"Some of these computers, when they are coming here, they are already obsolete and so the countries do not ask the question: 'How will this computer be disposed after a very short state of life?'," he said. "It is actually a very big problem ... some of these wastes are quite challenging to manage," Kibwana told a press conference in Nairobi.

"Waste is not only problematic to Africa (and other) developing countries, but the entire world," he warned.

This week, countries that have not yet ratified the convention and its associated provisions will be urged to come on board in order effectively to protect human health and the environment from hazardous wastes.

Unlike the United States -- which is not a member of the treaty -- the European Union has for several years now banned the export of hazardous electronic wastes to developing countries in order to help prevent the globalization of the toxic crisis.

In addition, the EU recently passed legislation mandating phase-outs of toxic constituents in computers, as well as requiring all manufacturers selling electronic equipment in the European Union to take back equipment at end-of-life and ensure its safe recycling.

UN officials said thousands of ships and aircraft fitted with electronic components are scheduled to be disposed of in the coming years.

According to a 2005 report by the European Network for the Implementation and Enforcement of Environmental Law (IMPEL), trade in the illegal dumping of toxic wastes has risen steadily. A joint enforcement operation carried out last year in 17 European seaports examined 3,000 shipping documents and physically inspected 258 cargo holds and found that illegal trading was widespread.

Of 140 waste shipments found, 68, or 48 percent, turned out to be illegal, the report said.

UNEP 27 Nov 06
Basel Conference Addresses Electronic Wastes Challenge

Nairobi, Some 120 governments will meet at the United Nations Office in Nairobi from 27 November to 1 December to seek solutions to the world's rising tide of hazardous wastes.

"As the recent tragedy in Côte d'Ivoire reminds us, hazardous wastes continue to pose serious risks for human health and the environment," said Executive Director Achim Steiner of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), under whose auspices the Basel Convention on the Transboundary Movement of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal was adopted in 1989.

"Like the climate change treaties, the Basel Convention promotes clean technologies and processes that minimize unwanted by-products. It provides the tools and incentives we need to both empower and motivate the producers and consumers of goods that generate hazardous wastes to pursue innovative solutions. In this way the Convention also advances sustainable development and the UN?s Millennium Development Goals," he said.

On Thursday the Nairobi conference will convene a high-level 'World Forum on E-Wastes'.

The Forum will confront the growing reality that, in addition to its many benefits, the global consumer goods revolution is generating massive quantities of end-of-life computers and other obsolete electronic equipment.

Some 20 to 50 million metric tonnes of e-waste are generated worldwide every year, comprising more than 5% of all municipal solid waste. When the millions of computers purchased around the world every year (183 million in 2004) become obsolete they leave behind lead, cadmium, mercury and other hazardous wastes.

In the US alone, some 14 to 20 million PCs are thrown out every year. In the EU the volume of e-waste is expected to increase by 3 to 5 per cent a year. Developing countries are expected to triple their output of e-waste by 2010.

Similarly, the use and disposal of mobile phones--which like PCs barely existed 20 years ago--is increasing dramatically. By 2008 the number of cell phone users around the world is projected to reach some two billion.

Leading cell phone manufacturers are collaborating through the Basel Convention's Mobil Phone Partnership Initiative to find better ways to reduce and manage this growing waste stream.

Any lessons learned from efforts to improve the management of e-wastes could also be applied to other obsolete consumer goods and end-of-life equipment, such as batteries, automobiles and ships.

The key to success will be the creation of a global framework for managing wastes that renders waste flows transparent, predictable and traceable, while reflecting the specific attributes of each waste stream. "Because you can only manage what you can measure, we need to shine a brighter light on hazardous wastes--on where they come from, and on where they end up. More and better information about waste will also help us to tackle the growing challenge of illegal trade," said Sachiko Kuwabara-Yamamoto, the Convention's Executive Secretary.

The dumping of hazardous wastes last August in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, and the resulting deaths and illnesses, has revived concern about the continuing problem of illegal trade.

A 2005 report by the European Network for the Implementation and Enforcement of Environmental Law (IMPEL) indicates that illegal trade is on the rise. A joint enforcement operation carried out in 17 European seaports examined 3,000 shipping documents and physically inspected 258 cargo holds.

Of these, 140 were waste shipments, of which 68--or some 48%--turned out to be illegal.

With some 94% of the materials extracted for manufacturing durable products becoming waste before the product is manufactured, reducing waste at source can clearly promote economic and industrial competitiveness.

The many other social and economic benefits of sound waste management include job creation, skills development and reduced clean-up and public health costs.

Governments are working through the Basel Convention to develop partnerships with industry, the public sector and civil society aimed at reducing hazardous wastes at source and promoting recycling and re-use.

They are also taking advantage of the Convention's expanding series of technical guidelines for the environmentally sound management of specific kinds of wastes.

The Nairobi meeting will consider adopting three new sets of such guidelines for the environmentally sound management of certain persistent organic pollutants (POPs). Many of these pollutants are amongst the most hazardous substances known to humanity.

Guidelines on POPs wastes and on PCBs were finalized in 2004. The new guidelines focus specifically on DDT, on other obsolete pesticides, and on dioxins and furans.

Another agenda item concerns the dismantling of obsolete ships. The International Maritime Organization (IMO), which has launched negotiations on a legally binding agreement that would clarify the legal requirements for scrapping obsolete ships.

However, governments recognize that the Basel Convention also has a clear role to play in this issue.

The Basel Convention draws on the principles of the 'environmentally sound management' of wastes and the 'integrated life-cycle approach' to industrial production. It sets out incentives and tools for minimizing the generation of wastes, treating wastes as near as possible to where they were generated, and minimizing international movements of hazardous wastes.

Reducing wastes at source will reduce the financial incentives that drive the illegal dumping that inspired the Convention's adoption 17 years ago.
links
Electronic Waste Guide a knowledge base for the sustainable recycling of eWaste with facts and figures, case studies in Switzerland, India, China and South Africa and a forum

You CAN make a difference about e-waste
Major Planet list of what you can do list about e-waste
eBay Rethink Initiative members offer a variety of solutions that make it easy to deal with your used computers, cell phones and electronics with links to the various options.
Greenpeace has background on e-waste and what you can do about it.

Related articles on Singapore: reuse, reduce and recycle
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