E-responsibility: E-waste, International Law and Africa's Growing Digital Wasteland
Year: 2012
Type: preprint
Abstract: “E-waste,” a term for discarded electronic products near the end or at the end of their useful life, contains hazardous materials like mercury, arsenic, and cadmium among other toxic substances. Although e-waste is the largest growing segment of the municipal waste stream in industrialized countries, international and domestic laws – and the enforcement of those laws – have not caught up. Due to weak domestic laws, weakly enforced international laws, and the high cost of properly handling, disposing of, or recycling e-waste, e-waste continues to be exported internationally to developing countries. The West African countries of Nigeria and Ghana have recently become the leading recipients of the developing world’s e-waste. Most of the e-waste that is shipped to the metropolitan port cities of Lagos and Accra, however, is unsalvageable, and those who often dismantle this e-waste come from poorer and younger segments of the Nigerian and Ghanaian population.
Source: SSRN Electronic Journal
Author: Zelalem Tesfaye Bogale
Institution: United States Courts
Language: English
Subfield: Waste Management and Disposal
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1601340331