"African On African Externalization Matrix"
Compounds Harm, Confounding Pollution Watchdogs
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| Interpol vs. Reuse Matrix |
[Lyons, France
April 1, 2013] Multiple European and American Police forces converged on African used computer businesses in Egypt, Nigeria and Ghana today, seizing equipment destined for reuse in the growing cities of Cairo, Accra and Lagos. The Africans were called part of an extremely organized syndicate which imported used "e-waste" from Europe and the USA, and laundered it for two decades, through a matrix of African "middlemen" at hospitals and internet cafes. Eventually, the importers planned to turn it in for disposal at African dumps and junkyards, many years later.
The sting on trans-boundary and trans-neighborhood movement of used goods was described by International Police and EPA as a complex system, or "e-waste matrix". The trans-boundary movement had not been apparent, and therefore hidden. According to the agencies, African buyers based in the UK, USA, and EU have cleverly avoided used electronics which were obsolete, in order to "bide their time" in a network of African-on-African reuse, planning eventually to burn the computers in a fire.
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| Acceptable |
"The buyers are organized, and therefore we can call them 'organized crime'," said Emile Lundermiller, author of
Interpol's 2009 Report on E-Waste Export Crime. "It's ingenious. They can apparently hide the computers, monitors, and televisions in plain sight for decades, in living rooms and offices."
Lundemiller continued, "Africans pay for it with African money, and distribute it into the cities before we can even catch it." He cited the PIOOA statistic, that up to 79.5% percent of Africans are actively involved in the purchase, sale, repair, use, and reuse of electronics which ultimately victimizes Africans. "It's environmental racism of the worst kind, African against African," said Lundemiller. "Africans routinely externalize waste to other Africans, exploiting each other, using more Africans as the middlemen, in a cross-fire of repurposed gear."
A Matrix of Self-inflicted racism:
As profiled in Lundemiller's 2009 Interpol Report on E-Waste Crime, the initial e-waste transaction is initiated by Africans, based in Europe, who cleverly test equipment prior to export. By avoiding very old and obviously obsolete equipment, the African buyers make the equipment pass as working and repairable, exempt from European E-Waste shredding laws. "They cleverly avoided the older, larger TVs. This would have been difficult to track if their inter-African system of trade hadn't tipped us off," said the enforcement agency's undercover spokesperson, wearing a grass skirt, and carrying a canvas drum.
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| E-waste repaired to disguise its waste-ness |
As documented in studies and audits from the Basel Convention Secretariat, African buyers showed a strong preference for newer-looking, black plastic, major brand name, and working equipment. Usually the ones rejected had more copper and precious metals, but the patient importers forgo the cash in order to stymie investigators.
Between 85% and 90% of the e-waste the Africans received in Lagos was made to function to such a high level that the e-waste could be passed along, for years, hidden through normal retail channels. After decades of reuse "laundering", the copper and other raw materials were to be harvested at African scrapyards.
Link to studies:
- USITC Estmates 88% of USA electronics are reused prior to disposal
- Arizona State University study documents 87% reuse prior to disposal
- Basel Secretariat studies (Ghana, Nigeria) find 85-90% of imports repaired or directly reused.
- BAN Kenya study estimates 90% reuse, 10% disposal
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| You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, er, Eden |
In the latest break-up of the Egyptian "E-waste Cartel", the Cairo importer paid (according to EPA) $21 per CRT monitor, eno
ugh to ensure bad ones were removed and good ones relabelled. Once the Egyptian government spotted the use of the monitors in internet cafes, prior to the revolution, it reacted by decree. Any CRT, working or not, is defined to be "waste" if it came off an assembly line more than 5 years ago (a time few CRT monitors were being made).
Once the Egyptian government dictated the working equipment to be "#ewaste", and seized them to halt "use", EPA was able launch its arrests of Americans selling working monitors into that market. (China announced a similar move, labeling books with images of the Dali Llama to be "e-waste like").
Lecturing a room of confused police and detained Africans, Jim Puckett, Executive Director of Basel Action Network in Seattle, Washington, described the
Reuse Matrix as a kind of internet "
Rabbit Hole". "
The African Reuse Matrix is a system. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? African Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it."
"Ultimately, we were correct about exports of intact units being dumped and burned," said Jim Puckett. "It may take decades, but we are now tracking the disposal of televisions purchased by Africans as long ago as 1978.
What hath we wrought??"
"The Waste Makers" by Vance Packard
