Tanzania Needs A Comprehensive, Inclusive E-Waste Recycling Policy-Academician -

By
Staff Writer

A
Senior Research Associate at the Chair for Social and Cultural Anthropology
with a focus on Africa at the University of Bayreuth in Germany Dr Samwel
Ntapanta said that instead of seeding capital to invest in high-tech recycling
infrastructures, Tanzania needs a comprehensive and inclusive e-waste recycling
policy to protect the sub sector.

Dr
Ntapanta, a Tanzanian national working as a senior researcher at the Germany
University said that the government and other stakeholders should create an
environment, where scrap dealers, crafters, collectors, and the manufacturing
industry can come together.

He
insisted that this can be done by creating an e-waste economic zone,
micro-financing, registration, training, and tax exemptions.

He
further said that the government should work with civil society organisations
to create consortia for scrap dealers, crafters and collectors.

“The
associations should be responsible for organising their members to move to the
industrial areas, where workshops, gears and tools for extracting materials
safely exist. Crafters should also locate their workshops in the zone,” said Dr
Ntapanta who is working on the convergencies of East African urbanism, its link
to globalisation, consumption and discarding of electronic and electric devices
(e-waste).

He
added: “Furthermore, established associations will represent workers to
government institutions and other actors, channelling their agenda. The
associations could be integrated with micro-finance schemes to boost members’
capital.”

He
went on to say that scrap workers need protection and recognition as essential
contributors to the city’s waste management and economy.

“However,
the most crucial action would be for the government to make these activities
tax exempted to attract dealers and crafters to move to the zones. One reason
for informal economies is to avoid taxes and fees charged by the government,”
he said.

He
noted: “Informal businesses have low to medium amounts of capital, which
motivates them to remain under the radar of government fees. An exemption would
encourage the move into the waste economic zones.”

“Furthermore,
I am promoting to enlarge awareness about chemical compounds, make protective
gear available and methods to reduce toxic emissions. These methods will only
be successful, if recycling centres are known and stop popping up at all
corners of the city – and the government needs to take seriously the labour and
livelihood they create informal e-waste recycling is scattered in Dar es
Salaam, unlike in famous informal recycling districts of Agbogbloshie in Ghana
or Guayu in China, where the activities are concentrated in one area,” he
observed.

He
pointed out that Tanzania is now facing a rapid increase in population, an
exodus of young people from rural areas to urban centres because of increasing
unemployment with the informal recycling offers good income to the majority.

“With
this, informal collectors buy defunct devices from the user and take them to
recycling centres. Even in developed countries, the formal sector collects for
free and sometimes charges collection fees. Many people prefer to earn from
their discards and will definitely not pay a fee for their old electronics,” he
said.

He
stressed: “Tanzania joined the middle-income countries. This means purchasing
power of households has also increased. With prices of electronics becoming
lower, more devices will be acquired.”

Dangers
of E-waste Management for Humans and Nature

Dr
Ntapanta went further to say that e-waste has often leaks to developing
countries, where its value is exhumed through different informal salvaging
activities. “During these processes,
value is created ingeniously, and livelihood is sustained precariously.
However, at the same time, methods used to recycle, chopping and burning, allow
embedded toxic compounds to be released, thus exposing workers, surrounding
dwellers and the environment.”

The
planet has entered a period where traces left by humans can be witnessed almost
everywhere. Waste is one of the most distinctive marks left by human activities
on earth. Waste produced by humans can be found even in the most remote areas –
at the bottom of the sea, in arctic regions or deep in tropical forests.

Economies
and daily lives are connected to waste – its production, sorting, reusing, and
recycling, or removal from sight.

The
number and variety of electronic devices in circulation today is as commonplace
as it is daunting, with households, workplaces and daily lives dependent on
electronic devices. Plug-in toasters and kettles are used to prepare breakfast;
offices are organised around computers and printers; cars run on batteries, and
meetings are held via conference calls, emails, or short message services.
Electronics are viewed as markers of progress, symbolizing human control over
time, distance and space. More importantly, they have become an essential part
of ourselves, perhaps to the extent that they can be considered as cyborg
prostheses.

However,
these electronics have limited lifespans, and with them, streams of waste are
emerging that affect the planet and regions of the world in uneven ways.

Some
of entrepreneurs who are involved in the informal e-waste recycling activities
in Dar es Salaam called on the government to give them financial and conducive
environment support so as to properly collect the waste products especial from
electronics.

“We
are taking care of our families from e-waste recycling activities, but
sometimes some of our members gets receive interference from either authorities
asking for taxes, we are collecting this scraps from very bad environments, we
need policy to support our business,” a Kinondoni based e-waste recycling
entrepreneur John Abraham said.

On
his part, Rajabu Juma who is also another e-waste recycling entrepreneur and a
charcoal stove artisan from Dar es Salaam said: “We are about 30 people here
who are using e-waste materials to create charcoal stoves.

“E-waste
is very essential to our lives because we are turning waste into new products
such as charcoal stoves therefore it creates grounds for our economic security,”
he said.

Another
Dar es Salaam’s e-waste collector, Karim Ramadhani said that many young people
are employed them through e-waste, and he said that there is a need for
government support for them to have advanced technologies on recycling.