by Detlev Ullrich

The reuse of salvageable waste materials is commonly regarded as an appropriate way to protect the environment and conserve resources. For the most part, that assumption is correct- considering, for example, the substantial amounts of energy and raw materials that can be saved by recycling paper, glass and metals. However, people tend to overlook the fact that the process of recycling itself sometimes results in considerable pollution, thereby posing a health hazard for those whose livelihood is based on recycling. This applies in particular to the recycling sector in Third World countries, where salvaging has less to do with ecological insight than with poverty and hardship.

Moreover, the nature and composition of wastes often impose in surmountable technical and economic limits on recycling options. It is with good reason, then, that people in the most advanced industrialized countries are beginning to attach higher priority to the avoidance and reduction of waste volumes than to recycling.

Recycling and waste management

It is the declared objective of waste management to minimize the share of material resources that leave the production/trade/consumption cycle in the form of refuse instead of as products that could be reintegrated into economic circulation. The wastes law of the Federal Republic of Germany sets clearly defined priorities: waste avoidance ranks above recycling, and recycling outranks disposal. With regard to recycling, the law says: "Recycling shall take precedence over other forms of treatment disposal, if this is technically feasible, if the resulting additional costs are not unreasonably high compared with other treatment methods, and if there is a market for the recovered products.

However, there is still a big difference between what the law demands and social reality. And though the introduction of separate collection in recent years has yielded gradual increases in the recovery rates of some valuable materials, e.g. now close to 50 percent for paper and glass, we still have a lot of untapped technical and economic recycling potential. Indeed, it still seems natural to hear people call today's industrial society a "throwaway society" because of the careless, wasteful way we treat our resources.

Quite different is the situation in most developing countries, where the practice of recycling is less attributable to sensible environmental consciousness than to economic and social necessities resulting from poverty and deprivation. Not only is the share of inorganic constituents in solid wastes much lower in such countries, i. e. usually less than 50 per cent, as compared to about 75 per cent in industrialized countries, but also higher percentages of some such materials are recovered. This is because:

• firstly, industrial raw materials are relatively scarce,

• secondly, a large percentage of the consumers impose low standards on product quality,

• and thirdly, there is a huge labor surplus - people who have no choice but to work for starvation wages.

Recycling and informal sector

According to some estimates, approximately 2 per cent of all gainfully employed people in the Third World (including children) make their living by collecting, sorting and using or selling salvageable materials from refuse. Most such economic activities are confined to the so-called informal sector, where lawlessness, exploitative relationships and high risks for life and limb prevail.

While the informal sector is certainly characterized by negative phenomena, it would be wrong to use this as an argument for instituting the same or a similar kind of waste-management technology and organization as that encountered in industrialized countries - thus rendering superfluous the informal recycling sector. This for the following reasons:

For one thing, the way industrialized countries handle their wastes is neither particularly exemplary (especially from the ecological standpoint), nor do Third World municipalities and cities have the financial resources it would take to install and maintain the requisite infrastructure.

For another, such an approach would rob most of the scavengers and recycles of their livelihood. As paradoxical as it may seem: the better a given system of waste management is organized and the better it functions, the worse effects it can have on the people who occupy the informal niches of the recycling sector.

• And, finally, the transfer of new technology always poses a hazard to precisely those established sociotechnical structures that have proved relatively appropriate to the given set of social conditions. The plain and simple - and sometimes ingenious- hand-made recycling products in many developing countries show quite impressively that people do not always need our help or other outside assistance to come up with their own intelligent solutions.

Alternative assistance strategies

Conservation by poverty

BUENOS AIRES, August 9 (AFP). - The combined effects of galloping inflation and the economic doldrums in Argentina are showing up in people's dustbins. Since everything is getting more expensive, more and more people are becoming able to afford less and less. So they have begun to economize on everything, and particularly on groceries. Thus, the last link in the chain of consumption, namely household refuse, is shrinking.

In the Greater Buenos Aires area, for example, refuse collection trucks last month picked up 40 per cent less household refuse - a severe loss for the contractors, who are paid by the ton. One company spokesman called the situation "truly dramatic" and said that the industry was worried about its survival.

Thus, while our offers of assistance should not exclude the conventional solutions of waste disposal - since no amount of recycling could ever do away with all the waste materials that need to be disposed of without detriment to the environment or human health - we should also and simultaneously aid and support the diverse activities within the informal recycling sector. Our main objectives in this connection should be to improve the working and living conditions of the persons concerned, help them upgrade their toilsome work in the eyes of society and help ensure that their self-help efforts have lastingly beneficial effects.

This will entail keeping at least the following two aspects in mind:

• The first is that scavenging and recycling is an unhealthy business. The inherent health hazards, however, can be reduced by appropriate organizational and hygienic measures; e. 9. establishing sorting stations and washing facilities at the dumps and equipping the workers with protective clothing; at the same time, the extent of separate collection from private households should be increased and the waste collection and disposal enterprises must guarantee that community refuse and special wastes are not mixed together and disposed of at the same dump; and, finally, by ensuring through more effective presorting that neither the recycled materials nor the products made from them can constitute a new hazard for producers and users (one example being the production and use of compost from non-separated organic waste).

The second is the economic situation of the scavengers and recycles, which they themselves can improve by organizing some form of mutual cooperation for reprocessing and marketing the salvaged materials without the "help" of intermediaries, whereby the government and the private sector should be talked into giving minimum-purchase guarantees at certain minimum prices. That, however, presupposes that the government does not merely tolerate the informal recycling sector, but even recognizes it as an integral part of the overall waste management system-this in recognition of the fact that the informal sector, despite its own problems and risks, substantially contributes towards reducing the solid waste volumes on the one hand and social costs on the other. In this context, non governmental organizations (NGOs) have an important role to play, i. e. we should use them as intermediaries for supporting self help groups of scavengers and recycles.

What we focus on here

Given the breadth of the subject, there is naturally not enough space for a full-scale review of recycling in this issue of gate, much less a detailed examination of all aspects of potential interest to the reader. Insofar as questions concerning technical details arise, we will be able to save no-one the trouble of referring to relevant special literature and/or consulting an expert. Within certain limits, GATE may be able to provide assistance through its Question and-Answer Service by conducting a search for pertinent literature (on request), setting up contacts with resource persons, or providing GTZ know-how.

Our selection of contributions for inclusion in this issue was based on

the following questions:

What kind of experience has been gathered with regard to the reclamation (composting in particular) of community and market refuse ?

On this topic, three different, decentralized and quarter-oriented project approaches from Brazil, Guatemala and Ghana are presented.

• What are the potentials and problems associated with recycling of certain used industrial consumer goods?

This question is investigated in connection with the following groups of materials and products: metals and rubber tiers, plastics and used oil.

• Under what conditions would the recycling of salvageable materials have to be ruled out?

This question calls our attention to the problem of waste disposal in rural areas and remote communities - dealt with here by way of two case histories from Colombia and Nicaragua. In addition, refuse from hospitals is used to exemplify the problems posed by special and hazardous wastes.

Considering the increasing amounts of hazardous and toxic wastes now originating in developing countries (or being sent there from other countries), this problem in general would have deserved more attention than we were able to give it here. As a rule of thumb, it is imperative that the avoidance, reduction and safe disposal be given first priority, since recycling often either involves substantial pollution or has to be ruled out on technical or economic grounds. To be sure, this applies not only to commercial and industrial waste, but also to "modern" household refuse produced by the affluent society, refuse which is becoming more and more contaminated with toxic substances. The present situation in industrialized countries is paradoxical in that the factories are gradually reducing their waste volumes by altering their production processes, while the market is being flooded with increasing amounts of consumer products containing ecotoxicologically hazardous and non-biodegradable substances. In the long run, only a strategy based on avoidance and the design and promotion of environmentally sound products can possibly lead to any marked improvement. Even though it will be much more difficult to get the process of production/product conversion going in developing countries - meaning that recycling is likely to maintain its present priority status for some time to come - low-waste technologies, with all their economic and ecological advantages, are bound eventually to become more popular there, too.

Abstract

In Third World countries ,recycling is a consequences of poverty and hardship. About two percent of the gainfully employed population make a living from recycling waste. Their work is often associated with health hazards which could be reduced by appropriate organizational and hygiene measures. the income of the scavengers and recyclers could also be improved if they themselves were to market and reprocess the salvaged materials. In this context non-governmental organizations can provide effective help.

Résumé

Le recyclage constitue un exemple impressionnant de la force économique et du potentiel de des populations dans les pays du Tiers Monde. Issu de la misere et de la pauvreté, le recyclage permet de réduire les plus graves difficultés économiques d'un groupe marginal de la population. Le recyclage fait appel a des aptitudes artisanales éprouvées depuis fort longtemps. Les techniques employeés vent simplex, il faut beaucoup de maind'oeuvre et - contrairement a bien d'autres choses - les produits fabriques vent ceux dont les gens ont besoin. Avec leurs produits, les "recycleurs" comblent un créneau avec un potentiel pratiquement inépuisable.

Extracto

Reciclaje es un ejemplo impresionante de la fuerza económicaly del potencial creador de los paises en vías de desarrollo. Nacido de la penuria y necesidad, el reciclaje ayuda a paliar las dificultades economicas mas graves de un grupo marginal de la población. Las operaciones de reciclaje se benefician de los conocimientos de los trabajos artesanales tradicionales. Las técnicas aplicadas son sencillas, ocupan a una abundante mano de obra y los productos elaborados son exactamente los que necesita la población; al contrario de muchos otros. Con sus productos los artesanos-del reciclaje llenan una laguna del potencial con un potencial casi inagotable.