Trade in poisons

Trade in poisons

By Barry Healy

According to the United Nations, 98% of the worlds toxic waste is generated by the 24 countries of the OECD.

These rich countries are running out of ways to deal with this waste, and disposal costs are skyrocketing. For example, between 1980 and 1989 the cost of land filling a tonne of hazardous waste in the US went from $15 to $250.

The easy option is disposal in the Third World. For a long time, Africa was the dumping ground. Western companies offered lucrative deals such as an attempted $84 million deal to dump waste in the Diosso Gorge in the Congo in 1988.

African governments choked off the trade by joining the Bamako Convention of 1991.

In the 1990s Asia has become the destination for the world's toxic waste, usually under cover of "recycling". Plastic waste from environmentally conscious consumers in rich countries was dumped in Indonesia. When Indonesia stopped the practice in 1993, the traders switched to dumping in Bangladesh.

Other items dumped in Asia include lead batteries, PVC scrap, polyethylene waste and even disposable nappies.

From GLW issue 293