Possessions and Politics: Sorry, But Someone Hates Us

Corporate Skullduggery and Competition in E-Waste

About 25 years ago, I was hanging out in the University of Arkansas (Fayetteville) student union cafeteria.  I'd returned from Peace Corps (training contractor in Cameroon), and was headed for an MBA program in Boston.   We had an impassioned conversation with hippy-ish friends about my plans to change the world, fight for the environment "from inside the system".  At least one of my pals was incredulous, said it would be impossible.

I'm still optimistic about my choice, even if most of my contributions are deflecting friendly fire from other environmentalists (ignorantly aimed at African, Latin American, and Asian "geeks of color").  But sometimes things get a little scary.

In the past 4 months:

1) Someone reported us anonymously to the state Fire Marshall for not having an inspected fire system.   Our QA/QC VP is an emergency medical EMT, and has it inspected religiously.  Shrugged it off, but when we asked the Fire Marshall to test our furnace for CO, he wrote the CO report as a "response to complaint" (evidently it counts as complaining on yourself in Vermont when you ask to borrow a CO monoxide meter).

2) Someone reported us to R2 Solutions something on ebay.

3) Someone listed our website as a blacklisted spam sender. - RESOLVED... This is Network Solutions own "report spam" tool, when you get spam in your Netsol mailserver box, do NOT use the Network Solutions own "report spam" button, because if you use the same server to forward your mail, your mailserver gets listed as a spam server.   Network Solutions, hello?? (JUMP TO BOTTOM if you are looking into this MXToolbox issue.)

4) Someone reported us to a major credit agency collector for non-payment of a bogus bill which had been paid (that competitor we know).

5) Someone reported us to the R2 inspector, saying that a maquiladora is export (we have letters stating it is NOT export, and the CRTs that fail testing and are shipped back to the USA are considered our property.  This is the equivalent of telling Sony or Panasonic that if they have new CRTs assembled in Mexico, and one of them fails or breaks, that Sony or Panasonic are "exporting for recycling" even though they bring the rejected tube back to the USA).

There's more, actually, that I can't disclose here.

There is one competitor we know for sure hired a corporate intelligence person, and when I contacted a New England private investigation service (largest) they were "conflicted out" (i.e. already hired by a competitor who listed us as a target).

Environmental Malpractice, Part 6: Free Joseph Benson

profile of anonymous negro

I put a lot of photos around the first false arrest - Medicom of Egypt, 2008 (prior post).  Jim Puckett's quotations framing the discussion of Egyptian imports, to the Arab magazine, put Basel Action Network's fingerprints on the smoking gun of "e-waste enforcement" to muzzle affordable electronics used by the students behind the Arab Spring.

The second framing victim is the Nigeria's "Hurricane Carter", Joseph Benson.  I don't have pictures.  But since Jim was kind enough to give me credit at the E-Waste Summit in Las Vegas three weeks ago, for having led him to Lagos, and since he was good enough to put the newspaper articles about the arrest of Mr. Benson into his presentation, and to quote Emile Lindemulder's Interpol report implying Mr. Benson's activities were "organized crime"...  I will use one of his, in "fair use".

In showing the photo below at the Vegas conference, and giving me credit for his being here, I have the right to rebut the "dirty little secret" Puckett says this photo is evidence of.

He thought his photo was evidence that Mr. Benson's arrest, which he showed news coverage of, was environmental justice.  Except for one thing - the only thing we see Mr. Benson was "guilty" of is recycling while black.



Take a closer look.

These are all uniform.  They are the type of small TV that are popular in slums, where people have electricity, have broadcast TV, but don't have big living rooms.  The market for this size of TV is so large that entire factories are devoted to transform used computer monitors to manufacture this specific size of television.   They represent less than 5% of the material that comes to Good Point Recycling.  This is not random as is television e-waste.

Jim said he took this photo himself.  He describes it as illegal, and shows photos in the same presentation of "Away is a Place", an Op-Editorial he published as the cover piece for Pieter Hugo's book:

This material made its arrival on African shores just some days earlier as cargo inside 40-foot intermodal corrugated containers — the shifting bricks of globalized trade turned techno-trash haulers. Around 400 of these, each containing about 600 computers or monitors arrive each month at the Port of Tema, Ghana, from the UK, USA, Canada and countless other rich and developed countries.  They may find a quick stay on the floors and shelves of hundreds of second-hand markets throughout Accra. But those that do not sell — about half, even if they work perfectly —are then picked up by small boys pushing heavy carts and hauled several miles to the outskirts of town, to be thrown away — to Agbogbloshie’s scavengers.  

About half... even if they work perfectly.  An amazing claim.  It means that even if Joseph Benson did test them, as he claimed, that the "crime" of exporting used TVs to be burned by dirty little children, is one Benson was guilty of.  No matter that Benson paid for transport, paid for TVs, paid for labor, he was willing to lose money, it seems, just to make e-waste recycling in England... fail.



Look, here's another container being unloaded, filmed by Greenpeace, which took Jim's 2005 visit and improved on it by tracking Joseph Benson's container to Lagos.  They sabotaged a black TV, put a GPS tracker in it, gave it to Benson's people, and PROVED that this was e-Waste!  [APPLAUSE]  This was the "sting" at the front and center of the UK Independent and Guardian articles Jim Puckett referred to in his Powerpoint.

Historical Marker: Mining Vs Recycling

The historical marker, near the Nevada-Arizona border, marks a gold mine, on federal land.

That pile of mining waste is farther away than you think.  Its b i g .

If I could just dump all the electronics onto federal land, submit them to acids and fire, I'd leave less pollution, and since the land was owned by the government, I'd have no cleanup cost.  Federal land mining by private metal companies bankrupted Superfund.

I admit that if we reform the General Mining Act of 1872 - which needs another "Historical Marker" - that the mining may move to rainforests in the southern hemisphere.  But reform of GMA 1872 would also boost recycling stocks, and would cause Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and other "mining magnets" to change their own policies on metal mining.

The worst recycling is better than the best metal mining.  Build your house next to here and drill a well for drinking water and see how it goes....

Here's another idea (thanks George Hinkle)...

Hopeful recycling for Africa in Ghana.

Sure we can do them both here at home.  But if mining is unleashed, why leash recycling?  THAT'S OUR DOG IN THIS FIGHT.  Hell,  instead of outsourcing mining, what if we outsource our better activity, recycling?  (My suggestion)

This is a company using reuse in Ghana to subsidize Ghana's e-waste recycling.   Bad as in "good".

If I ran "Basel Action Network" or "Greenpeace" or "Natural Resources Defense Council", I'd notice that this MINING activity is visible from the highway... Hell, it's visible from OUTER SPACE.  But a small recycling hut - even one with an Asian child pooched out on the scrap pile - would not be visible in this photo.

And which one, from this distance, would you be more worried about drinking from?

Answer:  See USGS.gov