ARSTechnica Reprints Discredited EWaste Propaganda?

ARSTechnica is a good blog for Geeks.  It was therefore a shock to see them feature a rehashed "E-Waste Export" diatribe, written by James Holloway of the Open University.

In his article, Toxic trade: why junk electronics should be big business, Holloway correctly identifies the importance of the rare earth metals, including gold, which are lost when used electronics are disposed of in the landfill.  Back in the 1990s, when I was Recycling Director for the Massachusetts DEP, I made much the same case.   The pollution, toxics, energy, and rain forest loss from mining reddish metals, from places like the OK Tedi Copper Mine on the isle of Papua New Guinea, represent a much deeper environmental priority than recycling green wine bottles and old packaging.


He quotes our friends at StEP in Europe (where I'm now typing) about the enormous waste represented by lost circuit boards, with the gold (and tantalum, and silver, and copper... I would add) if a computer is tossed into a burning pile of waste.

At current rates of production, $16 billion (or 320 tons) in gold and $5 billion (7500 tons) in silver are put into media tablets, smartphones, computers, and other devices annually. With growth in demand for smartphones and media tablets showing little sign of diminishing in the next few years, the flow of gold and silver from deposit to waste facilities is only likely to accelerate.

So far, a good chestnut on the importance of recycling and preserving rare earth metals.  But Mr. Halloway then twists the very study he highlights - a study I linked to here when WR3A / Fair Trade Recycling representatives were with StEP at the Pan-African Conference on E-Waste in Nairobi in March.


STEP and UNEP and WR3A all presented papers concluding that hand-disassembly was good.  Amazingly, most of the people at the conference in Africa agreed that geeks and recyclers prefer loads of used electronics from rich people to loads of used electronics collected from poor people.


The jobs represented by labor in Africa and China can be good jobs.  And hand-disassembly is a good process, according to the actual articles Mr. Halloway pretends to have read.  Rare earth metals (e.g. hard drive magnets) which are lost in European and USA shredders can find new lives in new hard drives when the drive is dismantled.  And the UNEP study showed that the reuse and repair jobs from used electronics imports into countries like Ghana represent 100-fold more jobs and employment than the "scrap boys" who dismantle used computers at Agbogloshie or Lagos dumps.


The negatives about waste shown by anti-export groups at those dumps, in study after study, is found to primarily originate from users in Africa... just as the "e-waste" in China mostly comes from Chinese consumers.   85% of the imported electronics, UNEP found, were reused and repaired in Ghana and Nigeria.  This put the 2009 "study" (rather an opinion piece) by Interpol in a new light.  The Interpol report, which Halloway cites, assumed that 80-90% of the used electronics purchased by Africans were burned in primitive conditions (accepting the Basel Action Network propaganda), and that primitive Africans stupidly burn CRT monitors rather than test them for reuse for, say, internet revolutions in African countries like Libya, Tunisia and Egypt.  


Halloway does the same thing as the Interpol author - using passive voice and a completely eroneous and discredited statistic - to build his case around.

" ..it has been widely reported that 90 percent of the USA's e-waste ends up in either China or Nigeria—a figure that appears to originate from an estimate made by Jim Puckett, Director of the Basel Action Network. "

The Interpol report found that Africans were the ones stationed in Europe, buying the used electronics.  And allow me to applaud with a hearty "DUH!"  Geeks of Color like Wahab in Ghana, Hamdy in Egypt, Souleymane in Senegal, and Miguel in Angola can't afford to pay thousands of dollars in shipping and customs duties to import computers for burning.  They either "fly and buy" (inspecting and hand-picking goods prior to export) or rely on Africans studying abroad to test the goods before they are shipped.  The Interpol report stunningly labelled these Africans as "organized crime".  The report stalled at Interpol and was not translated, it's now considered a TinTin era "white man's burden" paper, completely discredited by UNEP and other people who sat down and talked to the "geeks of color"... people Halloway didn't have time to meet before writing his rehash of covertly racist propaganda on ARsTechnica.

Does the Sun Orbit Our Compassion?

Guiyu, China is a polluted place.  Part of it is polluted by the textile industry.  But these burn-houses for circuit boards are real, and no one is saying they are good.  Not much "e-waste" recycling is done by the river, there is no CRT business in Guiyu, and the sophistication of the chip sorting and reuse business really deserves more credit.   But there is pollution there, enough pollution for children to have high levels of lead in their blood samples.  Without question, we can see it.  Guiyu deserves our help.

My fair trade recycling campaign is not about making excuses for the sale of circuit boards to places like Guiyu.  What we propose is that trade can be used as a lever to incentivize reforms.   Just as we lowered the price of SKD monitors sold to Malaysia in return for ISO14001 certification and glass-to-glass recycling of residuals, we believe that Guiyu's economics can be used to negotiate improvements to the standards for children.  This is a math problem.

My African Neighbors, 1985

Agbogbloshie, Ghana is really the same story.   There's no denying that its sad to see a kid busting a CRT tube with a rock.  I'm not sure why someone does that... there's not much inside a CRT tube but a metal shadow mask.  But I've seen it on film, and even if the TV was  used in Ghana for years, I'm not heartless.  Lead in children's blood bothers me a lot.

My fair trade recycling campaign is not intended to make excuses to send "toxics along for the ride" to Ghana or Nigeria.   It's intended to reform the trade, so that people keep their jobs, their repair jobs, their reuse jobs - even their recycling jobs, if we eliminate the burning. But most of all, it's about observing the constellation of the recycling trade more closely, listening, doing Q-sort, and not selling the conclusion that the sun orbits the earth.

RIP: Choma, Lima TV Repairman 1946-2011

Choma, Peru Tech, 1946-2011

As we wind up our re-tour, revisit, and update of the Peru reuse market, we need to share some sad news.  Choma was a TV repairman and longtime employee of ACETV, a women-owned Peru electronics importer (one of our hosts).   

The import business had slowed.  Jinex's brother's monitor resale shop has been converted to a restaurant, and her repair business, while still plugging away, is smaller (one of her 6 employees now does repair).  Choma, one of her older techs, passed away at age 65 about a year ago.

Neither side of the e-waste/e-scrap/e-reuse debate is immune from overstating our case, or of using people as pawns in our war of imagery.  I've used Choma's photo a lot during the past 5 years.  I hope not to become a "parasite of the poor" myself.  This blog shouldn't try to exaggerate the technicians in the emerging world as being some kind of a lavish success story.  The shops are dirty, the work is hard, the workers are poor.  Choma died of stomach cancer, we can't know what difference more money would have made.

Trade, as opposed to the "business" of stopping trade, is by definition something we want to go on and on.  We want to continue to meet the people we do business with, again and again and again.  Success for a fair trade recycler is coming back and making another trade.  Success is when the exchange goes well, both sides make a little more money and get something they would not otherwise have gotten.  But no business is immortal, and as cheaper new (and refurb, and gray market) products arrive in Peru from China, careers like Choma's may pass away, as the TV repair business has in the USA.

When you take pictures of technicians in shops overseas, you are hoping to see them again.   When they pass, like Choma, you have a chance to remember them and be sad for their families, but happy to have worked together, even if you never spoke the same language.  I think there's a distinction between the photos of relationships, and the drive-by photos meant to impart shame, which raise money without ever sharing the names, much less the dimes.   But recycling tourism is also borderline exploitation, and with humility I can say only that I know who Choma was, and I know whom he worked for.  I cannot say he knows me or that I was his friend.   I'm glad for him to have had a sustainable career, and I hope his family knows the respect which some of us feel for the Geeks of Color.

I do have film of the younger (and one older) generation of TV and monitor repair geeks here in South America.  There is still another decade of tinkering to do.  The Tinkerer is Gone, Long Live the Tinkerers.

The theme of this recycling-oriented graffiti-mural, photographed yesterday, seems to be, to take our causes seriously without taking ourselves too seriously.

EWaste Whiplash I: Recycling Trade Between Rich and Poor

clap, clap, clap.

WHIPLASH and E-Waste Trade:  Good and Evil do battle in international markets, non-profit NGO rescues virgin natives from sinister computer exporter / exploiter...

Smile and wave, clap and nod... that's the instructions for ewaste recycling companies when we read the headlines of E-Stewards and EPA crackdowns.   We aren't asked to share data on what the markets, like here in Lima, are actually like.   That would be like discussing sex, religion, profits, and politics all in one dinner conversation.  Everything mom told you not to talk about at parties.

From time to time a regulator or researcher confides to me, that they read the blog, that they personally are curious about fair trade recycling, and the Geeks of Color.  But they don't want to be seen talking to me, or Dieu forbid, leaving public comments.  I get enough personal private feedback to keep writing.  But no one wants to turn over the money-changer tables with me.  Reminds me of private discussions about Christianity in Arkansas when I was growing up... fascinating and intellectual, but not too loud, keep this between us.

But so much of the news coverage is stupid.  Dudley-Do-Right-Stupid.

Coverage has been 81.3% black and white, victim and protector, Reefer Madness BS.  There is more-than-a-lot of grey area between "consenting adults", and the word "exploitation" is used to describe the concerns third parties have over the consummation.  We are indeed exporting garbage, but it's in the form of negative propaganda about the repair and recycling trade.  Pictures of children in poor countries!!!  BAN.org and SVTC.org and ETB have become like some kind of Save The Children campaign which eliminates the hassle of sending a dime to the kids in the photos.  They are surrounded by good people, but it has become a charity based on NOT doing something (buying and selling used electronics).  The more money you give them, the more they tell people what not to do?

Just remove parts prior to export

Parasites of the Poor.  And when I say that, I'm considered too far right, too radical, politically incorrect, and crazy ol' uncle Rob.  People suggest I say it differently, i.e. in a manner which doesn't threaten the fundraising.   "We wouldn't be talking about e-waste if it wasn't for these NGOs".

Maybe not.  Maybe we'd have been talking about mining rainforests and coral reefs with conflict mining child warriors sending tantalum and coltan money to Kony.  Maybe we'd see that the biggest lead poisoning cases in Nigeria have nothing to do with recycling, but come from rare metal mining.  Maybe we'd be talking about MEST and the actual choices people recycling scrap metal have in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.  Maybe we would actually NOTICE when BAN uses a photo from the outside of this cell phone repair shop to make its case that Geeks of Color are poisoning children, rather than the truth, which is that they refurbish cell phones for farmers in Africa, and reuse chips from phones - reuse even component level parts which took coltan from child warriors to make in the first place.

Why do I get so frustrated at the non-profits?  Why don't I be more diplomatic?  Well, maybe because here I am, once again in the emerging markets (South America), and geek businesspeople are giving up, buying cheap Chinese virgin made products.  The choices given them were to buy from the Americans who are willing to sell "e-waste" to them, which unfortunately includes no one with a conscience.

The people with a conscience are all drinking E-Steward Kool-Aid and boycotting the Techs and Geeks like they are some kind of cyber-leper.  They face shakedowns at customs, as duty officers threaten to seize the whole investment as "e-waste pollution".  They risk too much when they buy affordable used products.  They are told to buy tested working, fully functional equipment from shredding companies which produce "no intact unit" California-fluff.



They are giving up.  And when they give up, they open restaurants.  They need jobs.  Used computers and TV repair was a good job, but that got too political for them.

Here is my family having dinner in a shop which 4 years ago sold used computers and TVs from Middlebury.  These people are still my friends, but they are giving up and trying something else.  Used USA equipment used to be 100% of their family income.  They now buy "brand new cheap-o" Chinese electronics (which is getting better and better), and run restaurants.  Across the street, a former competitor's shop is still selling used TVs and PCs, but my friends threw in the towel.  This will be how Peruvians meet Americans now, as tourists not as traders.

SCIENCE DAILY: Africa E-Waste Hoax Confirmed!!!

NEWS FLASH:  Most used computers and electronics found in Africa were purchased and imported at very great expense.   There is no incentive to pay for and ship junk.  The logic of anti-export organizations - that a few good ones at retail could explain their claim of 80% junk - may work mathematically, but makes no business sense.   Why would Africans buy the goods for $20, and pay $19 per unit just to ship each one, and then burn them for $3 worth of copper?  Today's Science Daily refers to UN Studies providing us with the truth about e-waste:

Domestic Consumption Main Contributor to Africa's Growing E-Waste Problem

ScienceDaily (Feb. 10, 2012) — In the five countries studied in the report "Where are WEEE in Africa?" (Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, and Nigeria), between 650,000 and 1,000,000 tons of domestic E-waste are generated each year, which need to be managed to protect human health and the environment in the region. The report sheds light on current recycling practices and on socio-economic characteristics of the E-waste sector in West Africa. It also provides the quantitative data on the use, import and disposal of electronic and electrical equipment (EEE) in the region. The report draws on the findings of national E-waste assessments carried out in the five countries from 2009 to 2011. 

The article takes its news from the report "Where are WEEE in Africa", published by the Basel Convention Secretariat.

FACT CHECK:  As fewer rich nations allow surplus e-waste exports to Africa, but demand remains, the quality goes down.   There are fewer suppliers to choose from.  PROHIBITION ECONOMY 101.  The lower the quality, the faster Africa's domestic recycling problem grows.  'War on reuse" makes it worse.

The Solution is obvious to the writers at Science Daily and the Basel Secretariat.   Allow import for reuse and repair, and have the companies exporting provide incentives and training to improve the recycling infrastructure.   In other words, Basel Secretariat and Science Daily just threw another big log on the Fair Trade Recycling bonfire.  Interestingly, the opinions in the Techie Listserve, Slashdot, overwhelmingly side with the obvious... reuse and repair are good, donating to good recycling beats banning bad recycling.

Multiple UN studies now confirm what we've been telling you from the field.  Most of the junk discarded by Africans was twice-reused for years, not hauled out of sea containers to avoid recycling fees in rich nations.   The used computer stores accept trade ins, but they make their money selling gently used equipment, like Goodwill or Salvation Army.   It's simple.  Poor techs, geeks of color, prefer to buy and work on rich people's surplus.  That's why they import.  Rich people discard after 3 years, and unless it's shredded, an African will try to buy it and use it for another ten years.  Goodwill, Salvation Army, and St. Vincent de Paul all know, you collect used goods in the rich neighborhoods like Wellesley, you may sell in Mattapan and Southie.

From the Basel Study:

The research revealed that there are some specific similarities between the refurbishing and recy-cling sectors in Nigeria and Ghana. In both countries, there is a well-organized repair and refur-bishing sector that is focused on used equipment either from imports or from domestic sources such as businesses and households. In both Accra (Ghana) and Lagos (Nigeria), this refurbishing sector generates income for more than 30,000 people...

 One major challenge for West African countries is to prevent the import of e-waste and near-end-of-life equipment without hampering the socio-economically valuable trade of used EEE of good quality. In addition, high volumes of domestically generated e-waste require well-functioning local take-back and recycling systems. Challenges include the establishment of appropriate collection strategies, ensuring that high volumes of valuable and nonvaluable waste fractions are collected equally and that those fractions reach appropriate treatment and disposal facilities. In addition, connecting informal collectors to a formal recycling structure is pivotal, along with appropriate capacity building and training. 

Locally adapted recycling technologies for West Africa should make use of the abundant labor force instead of deploying expensive shredding and sorting machinery. To ensure a maximum yield of valuable recycling fractions, West African recyclers should be encouraged to interlink with international recycling companies and networks to develop market outlets for their pre-processed e-waste fractions for a maximized return of value for secondary raw materials.  A sustainable e-waste management system would also need an adequate financing scheme, a level playing field and appropriate market incentives. It is thought that similar to policies in OECD countries, e-waste recycling systems in Africa could be developed in line with the principle of Extended Producer Re-sponsibility.

Is the system perfect?  No.  It needs reform.  What Africa needs is the same thing the USA and EU needed fifteen years ago - a cleaner recycling system for the stuff that eventually goes bad.  They DON'T need to be cut off the internet, or to be forced to spend half their annual salary on a brand new computer.  China has more scrap-economy demand, a different subject (see 2010 E-Waste Travels in Scrap Metal)