DEMONSTRATION OF ENVIRONMENTALLY SOUND MANAGEMENT OF ELECTRONIC WASTE IN THREE AFRICAN COUNTRIES

Transcription

1 DEMONSTRATION OF ENVIRONMENTALLY SOUND MANAGEMENT OF ELECTRONIC WASTE IN THREE AFRICAN COUNTRIES SSFA No 2015/SBC/22 Koebu (Dr.) Khalema AFRICA INSTITUTE 0

2 Table of Contents Background... 1 Project Justification... 5 Methodology (Including extension) Findings Lesotho Namibia Opportunities Challenges: Operating Issues Facing the Dismantling Facility: Africa Institute proposal Implementing Change: Pretoria Conclusions and recommendations Conclusion Recommendations... 21

3 Background Waste of electronic and electrical equipment (WEEE) or e-waste, is defined as whole items or parts or residuals from electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) discarded by the consumer before or at the end of its service life. The continuous technological change and the frequent replacement of electronic and electrical equipment, especially in developed countries, leads to a rapid increase of e-waste globally in terms of volume and complexity. E-waste has become a very prominent issue on the national agendas in several SADC countries, and the interest is growing steadily within the public and private sectors, as well as in civil society organizations. Most countries in the region have already started implementing different initiatives, including inventories, diagnostics, pilot collection activities, education campaigns to the population, workshops and seminars, which have led to the formulation of policy proposals, including the enactment of specific rules and regulations for the proper management, collection, awareness-raising, and the establishment of recycling facilities for WEEE. These activities have been mainly conducted through independent events, national and regional organizations or working groups and networks, mainly in response to local contexts, needs and developments. However, due to national differences in policy development and the status of WEEE related initiatives, progress has not been homogeneous throughout the region. The environmentally sound management of WEEE during its collection, storage, dismantling, recovery, treatment and final disposal includes effective safety, occupational and environmental management practices. These will be considered in this pilot whose aim is to contribute to achieving environmentally sound management of e-waste at the national and regional levels in Southern African countries. The purpose of this guidelines is to describe the chain of steps that should be taken in order to ensure environmentally sound management in material recovery facilities that recycle electronics, and to encourage operators at each step to know about, work with, and take their responsibility for human health, safety and the environment, so that the entire value chain works in both an economically and environmentally sustainable manner. 1

4 In theory, every part of end-of-life computing equipment can find continued beneficial use through the value chain, from direct reuse as a complete computer to a part of a slag-construction aggregate. In practice, there are economic limits to material recovery, and some process residues from all of the six steps will need final disposal, with careful attention for protection of the environment. Computing equipment contains more than 60 types of metals and other materials, some in large amounts, "primary constituents" such as steel, some in small amounts, "minor constituents" such as silver, and some in very minute amounts, "micro or trace constituents" such as gold. Of course, the exact materials are different for each manufacturer, for each piece of equipment, and they are always changing as the technology changes. Facilities that recover material from end-of-life computing equipment must be prepared for new and old equipment, with new and old technology. Some of these materials present little or no special hazard or concern, e.g., steel. Certain other materials may present a hazard when they are broken, crushed, shredded or melted, unless environmentally sound management practices are employed. In addition, other substances may be used in recycling, or may be produced. There are three main groups of substances that may be released during material recovery, and that should be of concern: original constituents of computing equipment, such as lead, mercury, etc., substances that may be added in some recovery processes, such as cyanide; and substances that may be formed by recycling processes, such as dioxins, and measures should be taken to prevent the release of these substances. To protect their workers and their communities, material recovery facilities should take steps that are guided by environmentally sound management criteria. These criteria work together to both guide and assist a materials recovery facility to achieve environmentally sound management of computing equipment and its recovery. Facilities will need to obtain more detailed technical information than this guideline can provide in order to accurately determine the most appropriate and effective technology and practices, but should find that this guideline provides an overview of many material recovery steps, and how they work together. When applying these environmentally sound management criteria, a material recovery facility should first collect end-of-life computing equipment, but only the kinds that it is

5 prepared, qualified and licensed to accept and process. Next, they should carefully remove and separate the most problematic constituents - those that contain hazardous substances that may contaminate other materials such as mercury, batteries, CRTs, which usually need additional processing. The baseline scenario and any associated baseline projects SADC comprises 15 Member States within the Southern and Eastern Africa namely Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

6 Table 1: Overview of baseline scenarios Country Status of E waste management Existing Initiatives Lesotho Botswana Mauritius Mozambique Namibia Swaziland Tanzania Zambia Zimbabwe There is no accurate data for planning, allocation of human, financial, and technical resources for integrated waste management. Collection is generally informal and a few exporters have emerged. South Africa Waste management legislation in South Africa does not require landfill site owners and recyclers to keep accurate records regarding e-waste volumes and therefore accurate figures on e-waste volumes and recycling of e-waste are currently unknown. There are several recyclers who still export the valuable components. Collection is still both formal and informal. Smaller initiatives to establish some formal collection are in their infant stages. An assessment of the sources, amount and geographical spread of e- waste was undertaken and model regulations developed in Lesotho. The Southern African Telecommunications Association has drafted Guidelines for e-waste Disposal. These guidelines allow for identification of various sources of e-waste and prescribe procedures for e-waste handling. The guidelines also call for the establishment of a SADC e-waste Recycling Plant that recycles waste in an environmentally sound manner. Several studies have been undertaken which culminated in development of plans and guidelines. These were mostly driven by industry. There exist Waste Act, 59 of 2008, but is still inadequate to regulate the industry. Industry Associations such as EWASA, E-waste Alliance, ITA are very active in engaging the government to adopt a comprehensive regulatory framework 4

7 While the SADC Governments have recognised the challenges posed by e-waste, the level of preparedness in-terms of policies and regulations is still low. Regional capacity building programmes on e-waste management have been carried out in some cases. These include e-waste inventory studies in South Africa, Lesotho and Namibia by the Africa Institute. A series of workshops and meetings were also held under the auspices of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and the African Telecommunications Union (ATU). The last was the Environmentally Sound Management of E-waste in Durban, South Africa on 9 July The Africa Institute also hosted the 6th PACE Physical meeting in September 2013 and an E-waste Policy Dialogue that came up with concrete action plan highlighting core issues necessary for an effective e-waste management regime in the African continent. Activities under this pilot project will were planned to employ a life cycle management of WEEE. There were two main objectives of the pilot; first as trials for selected management models, from which a learning experience would be developed. Secondly the pilot was to serve as active research sites for regional comparative analysis towards implementation in different settings. The current situation is that there are few entrepreneurs who are taking initiative to set up the system of management. There is also limited support for such ventures in general. The pilot shall serve as demonstration of feasible management options. The pilot demonstrations were mounted in 3 countries where collection, storage, treatment and transportation of e-waste would be established. Each pilot area or node was set to have a collection, dismantling and sorting activities that will be undertaken by the community cooperative or PPP. In other words the community must take the lead in this exercise. They must take ownership of the project. The benefits would then accrue downstream but commitment must come up front. Project Justification Without the proposed project the processes of e-waste collection, storage, treatment and disposal in the SADC countries will remain largely unmanaged and unregulated and continue to cause harm to the environment and the human health for a very long time. Currently, e-waste is often processed to recover valuable materials in small workshops using rudimentary recycling methods. In addition to locally generated e-waste, some of 5

8 the countries attract imports of end-of-life EEE products from abroad that add to the ultimate burden of WEEE. As revealed by other studies, unregulated recycling activities generate workplace contamination. As a result, workers and local residents are exposed to chemicals through inhalation, dust ingestion, dermal exposure, and dietary intake. Inhalation and dust ingestion were suggested as particularly important routes of human exposure and may cause suffering from such medical problems as breathing ailments, skin infections, leukaemia, and stomach diseases particularly acute in children. The implementation of the proposed pilot was expected to lead to the minimizing of environmental and human health impacts resulting from e-waste treatment processes. The project would also generate a wide range of such socio-economic benefits. Through changing the methodology of e-waste management the project would protect and generate new employment opportunities in the communities. Business leaders were approached in order to increase the e-waste business opportunities for women, thus enabling stabilization of family income and facilitation of demographic stability and economic growth. Project Design and Objectives Electrical and electronic equipment in most countries still find its way through general waste and ends up in dumpsites and landfills. Others are treated informally by individuals in an environmentally unsound manner including open burning putting their own health at risks. In order to curb these practices, a systematic and convenient collection system with planned downstream processing is needed. In managing computing equipment waste and e waste in general, there are Environmentally Sound Management (ESM) options towards protecting human health and environment. PACE had developed guidelines to assist and drive national policies in this regard. Sustainable options in e waste management that are being promoted are Refurbishment of computers and environmentally sound material recovery applying PACE guidelines and other related systems. The project implementation shall remain in the same three sites in three (3) countries; namely, Lesotho, Namibia and South Africa; where collection system, storage, labelling and packaging were to be applied as per PACE guidelines. Transmission options to an

9 identified recycler in South Africa- which is more advances and a common neighbour, would then be established. All management options shall be made to comply with the PACE Guidance on ES material recovery and recycling of end of life computing equipment and guidance on TBM of used and end of life computing equipment, in order to test the efficacy of the guidelines. Other relevant guidelines that have been developed for other waste streams were also considered. The extended project shall continue work in Lesotho, through placemen of receptacles for public drop off, and extensive awareness campaigns. In Namibia and South Africa, a survey approach was taken, in order to establish elements of the e-waste life cycle and document the challenges while establishing the impacts of the PACE guidelines to the processes. The Project absorption Namibia: Upon the first inception meeting in 2015, it became apparent that the activity of collection had subsided. Two reasons attributable to this were discovered as; first the management of the company realized that the venture was costing the company more money and very little returns. They had expected that it should at the least be able to recover its own costs. As a result, there were plans to cut it all out of the company operations. It became a part time activity where receptacles that have been placed in schools and waste transfer stations were now irregularly collected, while the dismantling staff was no longer available as they were assigned to other hauling activities. The second visit by the AI program officer was undertaken in June 2016 where some deeper discussions were undertaken with Environment and City Council management regarding the plans for e waste management in the city and the implementation of the pilot. This was necessary because it came to the attention of stakeholders that the company that was collecting the e-waste had resolved to halt the operation owing to the cost losses it was incurring without government acknowledgement. That meeting resolved to negotiate with the collecting company management to hold back the shut down for the six months, within which time the pilot would run, using the existing company infrastructure. An agreement was reached, an account opened and an invoice requested for the agreed budget. However, the person who was instrumental was taken

10 away from the center and there was no more linkage. The government could not make requisitions for funds into a non-government account. The electronic waste is still being dropped in the receptacles in schools and transfer stations and accumulating in the company storage, it is not clear what will happen to it. There is a need to identify a new player in the space, but there were no companies interested as the Trans World cargo had been doing it. Electronic waste that is piling at trans world cargo, Windhoek The receptacles at waste transfer station in Windhoek

11 In Lesotho, three containers were procured to be placed in strategic positions in the pilot area, where the public could drop off unwanted electronic and electrical equipment. Despite several and concerted efforts to secure placement areas, the Department of Environment, Maseru city council, and the large shopping centres management could not agree on the terms of placing the containers, they insisted on receiving rental for such, however, the containers were finally positioned on areas outside private properties with only one in one of the shopping centers with high density traffic. The containers were branded as in the attached picture. Branded containers for e waste receptacles in Lesotho. The prize of these went way above anticipated costs and a one sided branding has been considered in order to lower the costs. Several radio programs have been held towards awareness raising, but in the absence of persons manning the receptacles very little equipment has been observed; and this was mainly printers and photocopiers and refrigerators. It is expected that with time and continued awareness campaigns the voluntary drop off would increase. It was however evident through several interactions that people are hoping for buy back options for their non-working electronic equipment, as they still consider it valuable. In South Africa, the main challenge started with the complexity of working with communities. This has to be done through the Municipality, where some form of appraisal and political decision is made. The process needed to be driven by the Department of Environmental Affairs, who unfortunately did not get much cooperation. There are however individuals and groups or cooperatives that work in the space of solid waste collection and recycling, who are interested in e waste and have been visited by the Africa Institute program office. Their waste collection strategies are established, but remain informal and there are too many players in the sector, only one individual

12 was met who is interested in e waste collection. E waste that is thrown away with the general waste never find their way to recyclers. They are kept as valuable items. It became apparent that a buy back scheme is the only option for waste pickers to bring electronics in. Evidenced by the selling of metallic casings of computers to scrap metal recyclers. This project had not budgeted for buy back mechanism. A consultant was engaged who undertook a rapid survey in the area and surroundings. New project design and Implementation When the project proved to move slowly in all the areas, a new approach was considered. Thus upon the expiration of the contract, an extension was requested whence the new strategy was applied. Given the amount of work done, negotiations undertaken and equipment procured, despite the slow movement in the countries, the Institute was encouraged that, since in Namibia and South Africa there is a form of collection, dismantling and recycling, a comprehensive documentation of the existing ongoing processes, opportunities and challenges thereof would provide a meaningful baseline for policy intervention towards ESM of e waste in the sub region. Collection campaigns were to include house to house delivery of brochures and pamphlets in Lesotho. Experience with the current player is that refurbishment will not start any time soon, thus the guidelines were only evaluated in the South African situation. The table below is a summary of reworked or evaluated project objectives and projected outcomes: Expected result Activities Outcomes Clear application of guidelines and implementation of ESM of E-waste in selected member countries Identify and engage active personnel in the pilot areas to collect data Establish a collection system and monitor drop off rate in Lesotho pilot area Run wide awareness campaigns in Lesotho Establish sound storage conditions Active project coordinator, strategic container positioning. Comprehensive assessment of e waste management in North Gauteng and Windhoek An established collection system of E waste in the pilot areas Public awareness about e waste management and drop off points A well-organized and functional storages system in place

13 Assess e waste processes in pilot areas against PACE guidelines An Assessment report of e waste management in pilot areas. Methodology (Including extension) The project intended to use a wheel-and-spoke drop-off model. This meant that several drop-off nodes would gravitate towards a single hub. At the drop-off nodes the customers may walk-in to drop-off their various wastes. These nodes would merely serve as collection centres. The aim was to setup these drop-off nodes at places that have high population activities such as commercial malls and perhaps recreational centres. The drop-off collection nodes will be located alongside the normal refuse collection points of the municipality in order to take advantage of the infrastructure and network that is already operational in the country. For security, the E waste will be deposited into the containers that are locked so that the waste will only be accessed by authorised persons. Then on a regular basis the waste will be collected from these nodes and transferred to the hub. Upon extension, the project continued as originally planned in Lesotho, with placing of receptacles and awareness campaigns, while in Namibia, information on the operation of Tras-World cargo was sought from the officers involved. The operation of TWC is also elaborated in the e-waste documentary that AI produced earlier (available at Due to time constraints, and the observed challenges stated above, the study in South Africa was focused on known e-waste management companies that are members of the Electronic Waste Association of South Africa (ewasa). As shared in the inception report by the consultant, a questionnaire was prepared that was circulated to known e-waste management companies via . In the questionnaire, we addressed the specific devices listed in the PACE guidelines i.e. Personal computers (PCs), Computer Screens (Plasma, LCD & CRT), Computer keyboards, Mouse, Computer Cables, Printers (dot matrix, inkjet, laser, thermal), Printer/Scanner/Copier/Fax Machine combinations, Notebook computers, Laptop computers, Apple Mac computers. Questions were asked to determine if the equipment in question was collected, refurbished, dismantled, or processed at the facilities surveyed. In addition, we asked about interaction with the informal sector as well as legal compliance.

14 Below we show a map of e-waste recyclers in Pretoria as shown on the ewasa website. This formed the baseline for the stakeholder list. Since these companies signed the industry association s code of conduct they are expected to not only handle e-waste responsibly but also to ensure that any downstream processors they sell onto, do the same. Figure 1 e-waste collectors in Pretoria - (29 March 17) As a control, companies who may not be listed by the organization were also looked at. As expected, it was found that there is a large overlap between the companies who work with e-waste rather than just collect and sell on. Some companies listed separate collection points as separate entities on Google maps.

15 Figure 2 Google Maps search for e-waste disposal ( , ,11z Introductory s were followed up with an additional to encourage participants to complete the survey. A round of follow-up phone calls and telephonic interviews were conducted next. Finally, the results were considered and analysed. The stakeholder list and questionnaire are available in the Annex A and B respectively. Findings Over a short period of time that was available, no conclusive findings can be recorded except that people still regard their equipment as valuable, even though it may not be in any working condition. This has been attributed to two main reasons namely that, there is still hope that the equipment can be repaired, either with new or old parts when such an operator comes along or a better financial position is attained. Secondly, people have realized that there are business that are making profits out of old equipment hence they can only part with them through a sale transaction; some form of buy back scheme. This is very popular with scrap metal in all these areas. Lesotho In Lesotho there is absolutely no refurbishing activities of e waste. A few existing outlets that repair electric and electronic equipment are found to be relatively expensive compared with buying new replacement equipment s. These repair shops have

16 themselves accumulated big stocks of scrap equipment but still reluctant to part with them without some returns. They claim to harness parts from them. The major exposure of these mainly informal repairers is through the soldering process emissions only. There is no metal extraction like typical ones found in Chinese and Nigerian operations. Despite lack of public collection points, the amount of e waste that was collected between 2015 and 2016 was in the order of 40 tonnes and two consignments were transferred to South Africa and sold to DESCO. All this amount came from corporate sources: Mobile telephone companies, Banks, Mines and some small businesses. None from the Government departments or public. Desco remains one of the major recyclers of e waste in SA and is located in Johannesburg. Namibia Trans world Cargo E-Waste's goals are to work with businesses, governments and the environmental sector to keep Namibia at the forefront of green innovation in the waste, recycling and resource recovery sectors. To try to reduce electronic waste to landfill and increase the State s capacity for recycling. Their established Business Plan s was meant to focus on three areas: 1. Building upon the current suppliers of E-Waste base in order to find new markets and suppliers of E-Waste specifically focused on the Public sector in Namibia.(Government who sit on a huge stock pile of E-Waste) 2. Acting as the main operator and facilitator between Ministry of Environment as well as City of Windhoek 3. Finding new areas of downstream distribution in order to receive better gains from the work done. This Business Plan builds upon the achievements accomplished since 2012, and, through working to grow Trans world Cargo E-waste we will assist in the creation of new jobs and develop new green business Opportunities. More than ever before, collaboration, partnerships and engagement remain vital to address the Economic challenges facing Namibia through job creation and green

17 industry growth. The company is also look forward to building new connections in business, industry and government which will strengthen Trans world Cargo's position as a leader in the Green Economy and E-Waste Management. In 2012 Trans world Cargo Pty Ltd (Business Development Department) started the E- Waste project. The project initially started strong with much support but as there was no platform for the Partners to come together and help each other it soon became a one man show. With Trans world Cargo picking up the tab. The purpose of the project was to create cooperation between the Municipality of Windhoek and Trans world Cargo (Pty) Ltd as part of a new e-waste management service in Windhoek. The cooperation had the overall aim to promote the Waste Minimization Strategy of the Municipality and the 3 R principle: reduce, reuse, and recycle. The partnership program was to raise awareness amongst the Windhoek residents and business community on the availability of an environmentally beneficial recycling solution for E-Waste. The aims of the initiative were to call upon the citizens and corporate responsibility of the Windhoek business community to responsibly dispose e-waste items through the Trans world Cargo E-Waste. The supporting strategy was to offer convenient disposal solutions, and to market the service. At this point in time (2016) TWC is the only company that offers such a service to the public. This was supposed to be a break even business with recognition benefits for Trans world Cargo. However it proved to be more costly with very low cost recovery. Challenges: Three of the main issues that Trans world Cargo E-Waste faces are: 1. Operating costs of the project are very high with figures in the tens of thousands monthly with little to no income to counter balance these loses. The main cost being logistics-collection and distribution to a faraway sink in South Africa. 2. Little to no recognition from any of the main contributors towards E-Waste and no support offered with the project from any other avenues, government or private companies. This basically means that currently Transworld Cargo receive

18 no revenue out of a project which costs them a great deal of money every year. 3. Prices for Salvaged Materials: There were effectively only two customers that accepted anything from the collected waste. One is Scrap Salvage in Windhoek and the other is RJ Metal Decorators. The prices that these two companies offer for the scrap material are very low. In most cases less than half the price of the original estimates that were drawn up. The Trans world Cargo E-Waste project was a good idea and as a possible side-line, semi-self-sustaining and promotional business for TWC. The benefits of the project were clear and all the goals were achievable using the figure's that were provided from a model company in SA. The officer who managed the project for a short period was convinced that the project can be successful if given the correct supervision and management and some support from all involved. Below are the point of view about the subject in Namibia, the failures and the requisite corrective actions TWC should take and the time line they will need. Operating Issues Facing the Dismantling Facility: 1. Management of the Project The project was not given the time or supervision which was needed to be truly successful for TWC. The project was spearheaded by one person alone who was not able to devote all his time to the E-Waste. When this person left the little progress that the project was making stopped and the person who was put in charge had little interest in continuing it. This can be seen in the records and figures of the E-Waste. Every year the project collected less waste and recycled less. This obviously meant that the little income dried up and the project became a hole in the pocket of TWC. 2. Figures The figure's that were used in the original plan were not collected in Namibia but in South Africa as there are no current statistics for Namibia. These statistics of SA seem to be unrealistic of Namibia, but still the manager believed that the E-Waste can become a borderline or break-even business with the current figures provided a clear strategy is followed. The greatest cost of e waste management is logistics and the economy of scale is a prerequisite to sustainability.

19 3. Availability of Manpower. There is a shortage of manpower when it comes to dismantling. The staff from the warehouse are generally busy and have no extra time to spend in the facility sometimes even refuse to work there as there is no benefit in it for them. Their warehouse work obviously has priority as it pays the bills. However, when there is only work being done once a week it cannot be expected to make any money at all as there is not enough productivity. Africa Institute proposal Transworld Cargo E-Waste recently attended a meeting with the Africa Institute, the goals of the meeting were to arrange better cooperation between the government and a private operator of E-Waste (Transworld Cargo E-Waste) Attending the meeting were representatives from the Ministry of Environment (Deputy Minister) City of Windhoek officials and members of the Africa Institute. The goal of Africa Institute was to set up a plan for the management of E-Waste and provide financial aid toward the program. As in our case where there is already a system in place their job is to provide financial aid and access to more information on e-waste strategy's in order to make our program more successful. We have formed a steering committee on the management of E-Waste in Namibia in order to provide a platform for all the involved parties to work together towards a single goal. The aim is to reduce the amount of E-Waste that is reaching landfills and possibly causing life threatening diseases in the future through the transfer of hazardous waste into the ground and water tables. Suggestions for Implementing Change: A lot more work was needed to establish the e-waste collection into a viable business venture. The manager of the program wrote the passages below: Manpower: I am in the process of exploring if it would be worth-while for Transworld Cargo E-Waste to hire its own staff. The warehouse staff could still help in their quiet periods which would be a bonus to the facility. I want to calculate an estimate of what the average productivity is in one day so that I can work out how much money we have created from selling the scrap per worker per

20 day. On this basis I can calculate if workers can make a profit with dismantling, should it be successful, then I would supervise the workers whenever they are in the facility making sure that they are productive. At this point in time the warehouse staff are never available so I have not had the opportunity to do this Prices for Materials: I have compared the prices that we are offered to those offered in SA, to determine if it would make sense to be trucking scrap to them. I feel that the two buyers of our scrap know that they are the only local buyers and take advantage of it. Definitely the prices that SA offers are almost 3X what we are offered here, however at this point we do not have the volumes to make it viable to export and the quality of the current stock is poor being very mixed due to no supervision taking place in the facility. This I intend to change and create a stockpile of the higher quality materials in order to export them to SA and receive the higher price and hopefully receive a much needed income boost. I am also looking into other markets such as Europe and China. Avenues of Growth: With increased support of City of Windhoek as well as the Ministry of Environment we hope to re-energize the Transworld Cargo E-Waste project. Better co-operation between the three parties will hopefully provide a better understanding of some of the problems that Transworld Cargo E-Waste has to deal with and come up with some solutions to these. E-Waste principle is based on the three R's Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, I believe the Transworld Cargo E-Waste project could be successful if it is managed correctly. However it will mean changing our current mode of operations. At the moment we only focus on the scrap value of the individual items when they have been dismantled. These values are as previously mentioned low. The original plan for the E-Waste was that in phase 2 they would incorporate a Refurbishment and Re-Selling arm of the project. This I believe is where the largest opportunity for the E-Waste lies. The volume of goods that comes into the E-Waste, still in a usable condition is amazing. Most of the time people have upgraded a computer and they throw the old one away without a second thought. We take this perfectly good computer worth approximately N$400 and turn it into scrap worth N$15. Publicity, NEEEF AND CSR: Transworld Cargo E-Waste is the only project of its type in Namibia, this is obviously a good marketing point for TWC (Giving Back to Communities) or Social Corporate Responsibility. At the same time it could be creating

21 job opportunities for previously disadvantaged people upstream and downstream. This could score us up to 20 points out of 100 on the NEEEF (New Equitable Economic Empowerment Framework) Financials: The E-Waste could definitely run at a profit, and could most likely (depending on the amounts of incoming E-Waste) make enough to run with its own staff. This would mean that not only will the E-Waste look good for TWC but that it will be almost no burden to TWC Training: The facility would offer a good chance to teach trainees and other employees the basics of a computer and could offer them the chance of building it from the ground up. (It s not rocket science) but it s useful in many situations as it involves testing with an operating system as well as the hardware of a computer The table below shows indicative costs of the program as experienced by TWC: Cost Area Description Total Cost (N$) Collection 8, Labour Costs Pick-Ups: This is when we use our own vehicles and manpower to collect the E-Waste from the public and other businesses This is an average worked out on the amount of hours spent in the dismantling facility per month. 5, Plastic Dumping Costs Rent: Casual Labourers This amount is a rough average as some days they do not work at all due to other work taking priority These are the charges that are incurred when we drop off scrap plastic at the landfill. This is the rental of the land that is charged by Transworld Cargo to the E-Waste facility and the other direct chargers such as water and lights averaged per month. This cost is incurred when collecting large amounts of E-Waste and when cleaning up the facility when no other manpower is available or more is needed. 5, , , Total Average monthly costs 26, Income: The E-Waste makes very little income currently because of some of the factors previously mentioned. The income stream is also highly irregular. There is only one company that collects the scrap from TWC and they do not take it in large enough amounts. No month has ever had any income above these expenses.

22 Pretoria As expected it was challenging to collect information from all the players. In the end, we were only able to get completed questionnaires from two of the major players in the city. Many of the smaller companies do no trade in e-waste anymore or have closed down. Both companies who responded sell e-waste on for further processing at a ewasa member company who specialises in processing. The collector stores any collected e- waste in-line with the legal requirements until it is taken to the processor. The refurbisher, on the other hand, does some preliminary sorting and dismantling and then sells the fractions they don t use, on to a processor. Neither accepts specific hazardous fractions such as mercury switches, fluorescent tubes and CFLs. Nor do they take burnt copper in-line with the controlled metals act. Both companies said that they had only minimal interaction with the informal collection system and when they do buy e-waste from the public or informal collectors they follow the applicable regulations including the requirements of the Second-Hand Goods Act, 2009 (Act No. 6 of 2009). Collected e-waste is stored in accordance with the requirements of the National Environmental Management: Waste Act, 2008 (Act no.59 of 2008) and its regulations. After discussion with the companies, it is evident to the consultant that the Pretoria e- waste management companies we surveyed follow similar guidelines to the PACE guidelines and offer an environmentally sound option for residents who need to dispose of electronics. Conclusions and recommendations Conclusion Considering the results of the survey it is clear that e-waste management in Pretoria is based on sound environmental principles and the active companies can turn a profit. While the companies surveyed were not specifically aware of the PACE Guidelines before the study they were indeed handling fractions in-line with the guidelines, since they handle all material within the constraints of applicable legislation and the ewasa guidelines. While it is encouraging to find that Pretoria e-waste companies handle the fractions responsibly, it may be wise to conduct a follow-up study of the Ekurhuleni-based

23 recyclers they sell the material onto as standard practice. Such a study could confirm that the dismantling and recycling of the fractions are handled responsibly downstream. It should be noted however that the recyclers/processors in question are ewasa members, so it is likely that they already follow the industry association s guidelines that are comparable to the PACE guidelines. In Namibia, with the added support and acknowledgement of Ministry of Environment and Tourism and the City of Windhoek programs can be identified and better recognition of e-waste management established. There is a need for facilities that undertake refurbishment of electronics as a viable sink for e-waste in the country. Without such a program there are no alternatives for disposal of e waste. The contribution from Africa Institute, which was meant to keep and establish cost effective operations through subsidy was the best start, unfortunately a bit late for TWC. The major challenge to the e waste recycling is the incompleteness of the life cycle processing in many areas. Collection can be made, but without any ESM treatment, the waste will only pile up. This lack of processing also leads to the limited volumes as people horde their equipment, but if they derive some little value in terms of financial gain, that may be an incentives to part with them. Transworld Cargo E-Waste needs to create a business plan base on its own figures and records based on their experience as leaders in this initiative in Namibia. Clear precise records and spreadsheets with all the details needed to work out future E-Waste stream growth, incomes, expenditures, profits, amounts of received waste compared to amounts recycled. In order to do this there needs to be constant management and supervision as well as constant work on dismantling and re-furbishing. Recommendations The world digitization is here to stay and can only mean growing electronic wastes. Therefore countries must find ways of mounting incentive programs for establishment of facilities that would treat the waste sustainably. The initial driver of such is promulgation of regulations that prohibit e waste in the landfills and dumpsites. Corporates and Government departments are keeping tons of old nonworking equipment owing to tough disposal procedures. As they constitute the greatest sources of e waste stockpiles, they should be encouraged to set clear disposal policies.

24 The Government and municipalities should incorporate e waste segregation in their solid waste programs and to some extend subsidize emerging refurbishing companies. Part of the refurbished computers can be donated to schools. This is applicable to Lesotho and Namibia in this case. In South Africa a follow up study focusing on refurbishers operations to evaluate compliance to guidelines maybe worthwhile. Continued efforts to inform and educate e-waste players in the city through specific courses in hazardous fraction identification, sorting of e-waste and legal requirements can be beneficial for players. Recovery of electronic parts should be encouraged at the landfills, during segregation of waste, with the informal collectors organized in order to take advantage of economy of scale. The Africa Institute, as a regional center should continue to hold capacity building events and visits to facilities in order to impart good practices in the e waste management cycle.